


Ingestion

by amythis



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Bisexual Hawkeye Pierce, F/M, M/M, Marijuana, Threesome - F/M/M, bisexual Trapper John McIntyre
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-06-05 07:22:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 26,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15165536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amythis/pseuds/amythis
Summary: The Pierces visit newly divorced Trapper John, M.D., in 1966 San Francisco.  Consistent with but not a part of my "Margaret And Somehow Hawkeye" series.  Uses a few details from the Pernell Roberts TV series, which I've never seen.





	1. Protection

It was the summer before the Summer of Love, so no songs were urging Mr. and Mrs. Pierce of Crabapple Cove, Maine to go to San Francisco and wear flowers in their hair. Besides, they were both over 30, over 40 in fact.

They came to California to drop off their eleven-year-old son in Mill Valley. He was going to go camping with the Hunnicutts for two weeks in the redwoods. Larry Pierce was happy to see not only his best friend, ten-year-old Mike, but Uncle B.J. and Aunt Peg. As for Erin Hunnicutt, Hawkeye suspected she was his son's first serious crush.

"He's just a little boy!" Margaret said when Hawkeye shared his theory.

"Do you want to know how old I was when I had my first crush?"

"Well, you were precocious. Besides, Erin is 15."

"Maybe he likes older women. I know I do." He waggled his eyebrows Grouchoically, even though Mr. Marx kept marrying younger women.

It was sort of a running joke between them that the one thing she wouldn't tell him was her age. He was 45 and she was "around that." There were smudges on her birth certificate and her driver's license. Even when they filled out the paperwork to get married a dozen years ago, she kept her age secret from him. He supposed it was one of those things he wasn't meant to know, like what his best friend's initials stood for.

Larry and his father each had two best friends, a Hunnicutt and a McIntyre. J.T. was twelve and lived with his mother in Boston, so Larry didn't see him much more often than he saw Mike. Mostly, the three boys kept in touch through letters and phone calls, as their fathers did.

The divorce had shifted things. Trapper decided to move out to the West Coast, after hearing B.J. rave about it for so long. But he was a big city boy, so that meant LA or San Francisco. "And I hate smog," Trapper said.

His son was going to visit him for a week in a week. It wasn't the first time the boy had taken a plane by himself. In some ways, J.T. was old for his age, with his father's confidence, crooked smile, and curly blond hair.

Larry, in contrast, had been nervous about flying, even with his parents, although he loved it once he was in the air. He was very glad that he'd be flying into JFK with J.T.

"Promise me you'll wear your sweater at night," Margaret said to her son when they bade him goodbye.

Her overprotectiveness no longer surprised Hawkeye. After all, Larry was an only child. It was just, Hawkeye couldn't help thinking that the head nurse he met sixteen years would've tried to toughen up her son. Maybe the failure to make a "real man" out of Frank Burns had discouraged her. Or maybe her brief marriage to a very manly lieutenant colonel had made her no longer be the kind of woman who'd eagerly send a man out to fight, or to defuse a bomb.

"Yes, Mom. After all, it's California in July. Maybe I should've packed my parka." Larry had definitely inherited his father's sarcasm. (And jet-black hair, but his eyes and his idealism were his mother's.)

"It does get cold at night, especially in the woods."

Margaret shot B.J. a look of gratitude.

When it was Hawkeye's turn to bid farewell, he said, "Don't come home with poison ivy." That meant, "I love you and I'm proud of how you're growing up."

Larry said, "I won't," which Hawkeye interpreted as, "Thanks, Dad. I love you, too."

And then they left their only child in the care of their dear friends and got in the rental car to visit one of their other dear friends. Well, Trapper John was more his friend than hers, but Margaret wasn't exactly indifferent to him.


	2. Threats

As Ben drove the rental car south, Margaret shifted from worrying about her son to replaying her private exchange with Peg in the kitchen the day before.

"Thank you," Peg said as Margaret handed her the package of spaghetti noodles. "So I know you hate gossip, but...."

"I never said I hate it. I said I'm no good at it." She had had so few close friends in her life, especially female friends. She supposed she had gossiped with Frank Burns, but they never called it that. It was "sharing information in order to enhance morale and discipline." Ironically, this had indirectly led to her falling in love with Hawkeye, the person they most gossiped about. Captain Pierce was always the center of attention at the 4077th, but she had paid him more attention than she had to. At first, she noted flaws, of which he had many, but gradually she came to appreciate his strengths. And even some of the "flaws," like his irreverence, in time came to seem like strengths.

Peg smiled as she opened the package and started adding the pasta to the boiling water. "Well, then I guess I won't ask what you and Melanie talked about last time."

It was still odd to hear the now former Mrs. John Francis Xavier McIntyre referred to as anything other than Louise. Admittedly, it made it less confusing for her to have a different first name than Frank's ex-wife.

"We talked about her reinventing herself, going back to school, getting a part-time job."

"Renaming herself?"

"Yes." Margaret didn't want to judge Melanie too harshly. After all, Margaret had had to shed a nickname imposed by others, when she outgrew who "Hot Lips" was.

"What did she say about Trapper?"

"Not much, surprisingly."

"Hm."

"What?"

Peg looked out a kitchen window, as if confirming that the men and boys were still outside playing football. Margaret looked out a different window and had to smile. Hawkeye had never been good at sports. Not just Trapper but Father Mulcahy was much more of an athlete. It was funny, really, considering how good Hawkeye was in bed. But when she once pointed this out, he said, "I just prefer indoor sports. Like chess."

Peg turned back to her and said, "There's something fishy about their divorce."

"Fishy?"

"Yes. Don't get me wrong, I know Trapper wasn't the most faithful husband, especially during the war."

Margaret bit her tongue. As far as she knew, Peg still didn't know that B.J. had had a one-night stand in Korea, and fallen for another woman sometime after that. Hawkeye and Peg had had a conversation back in '54, where he let her continue to think that B.J.'s only "infidelity" was with Hawkeye, which she had already processed and accepted, it being wartime and Hawkeye not being a threat.

"But if the grounds for divorce were adultery, what happened to The Other Woman?"

"Maybe it was just a fling and it's over. Or maybe it was all his adultery over the years."

Peg shook her head and looked like she was going to say something further, but the door leading from the sunny yellow kitchen to the tangerine dining room swung open. A girl with long, ironed blonde hair, a red-and-black plaid halter top, and cut-off jean shorts walked in. "Mom, have you seen my—"

"The table."

"Thanks." Erin scooped up her transistor radio and put the headphones on.

Margaret smiled to herself, at the verbal shorthand between mother and daughter, and at the way young people could so easily transport themselves to another world, in this case through the "British Invasion" that the two mothers could faintly hear as Erin blasted it into her eardrums. Margaret was sure that B.J., as a father and a doctor, had warned Erin of the health hazards of loud music, as Hawkeye had with Larry. Their son had replied, "And I'm sure the fun things you did when you were young were never bad for your health, Dad." Erin had probably pointed out that her father still rode a motorcycle.

Peg waited until her daughter was out of the room and they could no longer catch bits of "Mother's Little Helper" before saying, "Trapper of course won't tell us anything."

Margaret assumed the "us" was Peg and B.J., although Peg could've meant women. Since McIntyre had moved a half hour away from Mill Valley, the Hunnicutts had had him over for dinner a couple times, but Margaret couldn't imagine him opening up to either of them. Trapper and B.J. had just missed meeting each other in Korea and since then had only met up at medical conferences. Peg until a couple months ago had only spoken to Trapper on the phone and mostly known him by reputation. Still, B.J. and Trapper were better friends than either was with Charles, even if they were much closer to Hawkeye. A similar dynamic existed with Larry's two buddies, who were pen pals but didn't visit each other, although they'd been to Crabapple Cove together a couple times. Of course, the age difference between the freckle-faced ten-year-old who collected comics and the "hip" and "cool" almost-teenager added to their distance, although J.T. said when asked, "Mike's a nice kid."

"Does he seem happy?"

Peg shrugged. "For a divorced man, I guess. I mean, I don't know what he was like before. You can judge that better than I can."

Margaret had nodded, although she couldn't really imagine Trapper opening up to her either. In Korea, he'd had more of a shell than Hawkeye had. Hawkeye could cry and rant and literally bare everything, even in the middle of the mess tent, but Trapper never crumbled, except occasionally in front of Hawkeye. He might reveal what had really happened in his marriage, but only to Hawkeye, who wouldn't necessarily pass it on to Margaret. And what Ben told her might not be fodder for gossip with Peg.

The men and boys had come in from the back yard then and so that was the end of that gossip session.

Now Margaret was in a car with her husband and didn't know what to say about Trapper.

"He'll be fine."

"I suppose so." She wasn't exactly worried about Trapper. He was a survivor. But it couldn't have been easy to leave not only a marriage but your home and children. Well, the girls were off at college, but Radcliffe and they still came home for vacations and some weekends. Margaret's divorce had made small difference in her circumstances. She kept her home and occupation, which were the same thing really, before, during, and for a year after her marriage. And Larry was a peacetime baby.

"You know B.J. and Peg are good parents and they'll make sure he doesn't get eaten by bears."

She laughed and didn't admit that she was not in fact being an overprotective mother at the moment.


	3. Sides

After Trapper made his bed in preparation for the Pierces' visit, he couldn't help laughing and shaking his head at the thought that it was typical that Hawkeye would have sex in it before he would. Not that they were in friendly competition like they were back in Korea, but it did amuse him.

This wasn't his marital bed. That was back in Boston, in the custody of Louise, sorry, Melanie. This was the bed for his swinging bachelor pad, but after two months in San Francisco, the only sex it had seen was solitary. Not that he hadn't been out on a few dates, and not that he hadn't had a few offers, but he just couldn't seem to hop into bed with someone like he could when he was younger. This bed or any other.

He had no doubt that Hawkeye would have sex with Hot Lips that weekend. His best buddy had never kissed and told much about her, even before they got married, but Trapper could tell just by looking at them that they were still warm for each other's form. Not that he begrudged them that. He knew that they'd both had rocky love lives on the way to ending up together. In fact, B.J. had dropped hints to Trapper about Margaret's unhappy first marriage, things Hawk had never told Trapper.

Trapper had been skeptical about this marriage at first, remembering what Margaret was like in the early days in Korea. But she and Hawkeye had both changed. And they made each other happy, apparently not just in bed. It had been, what, twelve years now, since he was a reluctant best man for them?

That was in Crabapple Cove, the little town in Maine that Hawkeye had never really left. Trapper had gradually realized that. Yes, Hawk had the "wine, women, and song" side of him, but once he left Korea, maybe even before then if what B.J. said was true, the small-town doctor side became dominant. Hawkeye wanted peace, not just in the sense of no war, but in the sense of quiet non-chaos. He had that, living in his childhood home, with his dad, wife, and son. He never seemed bored, or boring. His phone calls and letters were as sharp and funny as ever, even if lately he'd been worrying about Vietnam.

Trapper would've thought it was just his friend settling further into middle age, but Trapper was a year older and restless. Becky, who was going into grad school for Psych at Radcliffe that Fall, had asked him if it was a midlife crisis, for him or her mother, but he didn't think that was it exactly. Maybe both he and "Melanie" had been taking stock, but that wasn't the whole story. As for Kathy, who was 20 now, she said, "Of course I'm not happy about the divorce, Daddy, but you two have got to do your own thing, right?"

So now he was trying to figure out what his own thing was, besides of course medicine, his first and, it seemed at times, his only real love. OK, he loved his kids but they were growing up, even "the baby." J.T. was practically a teenager and he'd always been independent. He wasn't a mama's boy like Larry. Not that Trapper disliked Larry. As J.T. said, Larry was a nice kid. But he was still a little boy and, if he was anything like his dad, probably always would keep that side, even when he was a middle-aged doctor living in that damn charming Craftsman house on the edge of the woods.

J.T. wasn't sure about becoming a doctor, and Trapper didn't want to pressure him into it. Yeah, there was the side of him that wanted his only son to follow in his footsteps. OK, yes, Becky, or Rebecca as she sometimes wanted to be called, was going to become a doctor, but a psychologist. And, no offense to Sidney Freedman, but that wasn't the same thing, working on the mind instead of the body. Trapper respected it, just like he respected Father Mulcahy's soul-work, but he couldn't relate to it. Trapper knew minds and souls were important, and you didn't want to lose either, but the body mattered most.

So if the Pierces wanted to join their bodies in his bed, as seemed likely, they were welcome to it. He'd be sleeping alone in the guest bed, the bed where in a week a twelve-year-old boy would likely be listening to the Beatles on his transistor radio, trying to analyze every chord, every note, to play on his guitar later.

That was something that J.T. had inherited, besides the first name. Trapper hadn't pressured him into it. He just took his guitar home from Korea and every once in awhile played it for the kids. He had never touched a musical instrument before the war— his mind automatically inserted a Piercian quip here, about organs of course— but Capt. Spalding had taught him how to play and given him one of his old guitars. Spalding recorded a few folk albums after he got shipped home, but even in the early '60s, when Kathy "discovered" him in a record store, he was no Pete Seeger or Bob Dylan, and he never gave up his day job. 

And Trapper wasn't in his league. Music was just a hobby, and not even Trapper's favorite.

But for J.T., well, "Music is the realest thing there is, Dad." If he was a few years older, he probably would've formed a band and planned to be a rock star. Trapper knew that some kids (and anyone under 25 seemed like a kid to Trapper these days) did make a living from it. If it was what J.T. wanted and he had the talent and the luck, Trapper wouldn't stand in his way. Then again, three years ago, before the Beatles invaded, J.T. loved football and he did have his dad's arm. Who knew what he'd want or believe in three years from now?

Sometimes Trapper envied B.J., with his perfect kids and wife, perfect life. Whenever Trapper went to dinner in Mill Valley, he could see himself settling in, settling down. Peg could find him a nice, pretty girl with a good sense of humor and a lot of patience. Not too young to have stepdaughters in their 20s. Maybe 30 or 35. With a job but not ambitious. Someone he'd want to come home to.

And then he'd drive back down the Golden Gate Bridge and see the sparkling city lights, feeling like he was coming out of a stupor. He'd let the chaos and confusion of The City surround him. And they did capitalize it, everyone for miles around, like there was only one city for them, while for him it was just one of many cities he'd known.

And yet, there was something different about Frisco, as he stubbornly kept calling it, mostly to annoy the natives. It was a city of contradictions and fluctuations. He'd been living there only a couple months and he felt like it would take him the rest of his life to understand the place. Sort of like how Hawkeye described Hot Lips, the few times he talked seriously about his wife.

"I feel like I've known her forever but I'm still discovering her. She is Hot Lips, but she's also Margaret and all these other sides."

Trapper wondered if he had time for a joint before the Pierces arrived. He definitely couldn't light up while they were here. The ex-major would have a fit. And it would cancel out all the cleaning he'd done to impress her, or at least to forestall her nagging. When he and Hawk lived in the Swamp, they'd wallowed in the filth, but that was more Hawk than him. And yet, the Craftsman was relatively neat, although that might've had more to do with Dr. Dan than anyone else, since the long-time widower was set in his ways.

Anyway, Mrs. Pierce would not approve of reefer. Trapper had to grin at the thought of throwing a little pot party for his guests. He remembered the time the three of them got drunk together, singing songs and mocking Frank. But alcohol was legal, even during Burns's prohibition. Trapper wondered if he had time to run to the liquor store on the corner.

Then someone knocked, and Trapper's grin flickered off and on, settling into a crooked smile when he saw the bottle in his best friend's hand.


	4. Vintage

When Trapper opened the door, Hawkeye half expected to see him in khaki, or a Hawaiian shirt. It'd only been a few months since the last visit, to the lobby of a Boston hotel during Trap's separation, but Hawkeye was remembering back sixteen years, to when they first met at the 4077th and Captain McIntyre said, "There are two cots left. If you don't snore too loud, you can sleep next to me."

"Do we have to share a pillow?"

If McIntyre had been disgusted or violent, then Hawkeye would've chosen the empty cot on the other side of the tent. Instead, McIntyre looked surprised for a moment and then said, "No, you can rest your head on my shoulder."

By the time Major Burns came in and cried, "How did this place degenerate into a swamp of iniquity in just an hour?", Trapper John was Hawkeye's new best friend. Hawkeye made friends easily, but not this rapidly since Tommy Gillis in the fifth grade.

"We're efficient degenerates," Hawkeye said, as he poured another glass of beer for Trapper.

Trapper threw his dirty socks on the floor next to Hawkeye's muddy boots and said, "You should see what we could do in the nurses' tent in an hour."

By then, Hawkeye knew that Trapper had a wife and kids but, one, he had been with other women, and two, he didn't mind flirting with Hawkeye but didn't take it seriously. Which was fine, especially since they would be sharing this tent with two other men. (Spearchucker showed up a few minutes later, and, yes, that was what the Negro doctor wanted to be called. Burns didn't have a nickname, but they'd take care of that.)

Despite the roomies— and Spearchucker got shipped home pretty quick, lucky guy— it was only a few weeks before Hawkeye rested his head on one of those broad shoulders. They weren't sleeping, although they were exhausted from the OR. They were cuddling sitting up in Hawkeye's bed.

"You did good work today, Kid."

"Kid?!" Hawkeye sputtered. "I'm only a year younger than you!"

"Yeah, but I've seen more of life than you have."

"Oh, right. I'm the hick from Maine and you're the street-smart city boy."

"Out to corrupt you," Trapper said, managing to pour more "brandy" from the Still without letting go of Hawkeye or spilling outside the glasses they'd "borrowed" from the VIP tent.

"With wine, women, and song?"

"Bring me a harmonica. Or a nurse."

And then they kissed.

"Are you a nurse?" Trapper asked.

"I'm a candy striper."

"You'd look cute in stripes."

"Stars and stripes?"

"Yeah. Why'd you kiss me?"

"I thought you kissed me."

"Oh, that's all right then. Uh, I usually don't kiss guys."

"Then you're not going to do a very thorough job of corrupting me."

"I'll work on it. Um, you know I'm a married man, right?"

"I heard something like that, but I thought maybe it was a nasty rumor started by your wife."

"Louise never wants me to have any fun."

"Well, I'll make sure that kissing me isn't any fun."

"According to the nurses, that shouldn't be difficult."

"Hey!"

"Just teasing, Hawk. They've told me you're very efficient and thorough."

"And they told me your tongue should be bronzed."

"Ouch! I hope they don't want it hung in the Kissing Hall of Fame."

"I'm sure it'd be well-hung."

This was further than Hawkeye had ever bantered or flirted with a man before. He could've blamed it on the Still, since they were still working on the right recipes, but he knew that wasn't it. Trapper was so easy-going, so willing to play along with whatever Hawkeye came up with, that Hawkeye kept wanting to see how far he could take this. (It was only later, when upright, forthright, fine, clean, wholesome, sneaky, pranking, complaining, argumentative, self-righteous B.J. came along that Hawkeye realized how much Trapper hadn't stood up to him. And he'd never been sure if it was because Trapper hadn't really cared about anything or if Trapper just simply agreed with him most of the time.)

"Is that your medical opinion?" Trapper asked.

"Stick out your tongue and say ah."

Trapper obliged and Hawkeye kissed the tip of his tongue before doing more customary tongue-kissing. Trapper did have a great tongue. Not only was it talented, but it tasted delicious, even with swill from the Still.

They didn't always drink when they kissed, and they didn't always kiss when they drank. But they drank a lot.

And it seemed appropriate to bring alcohol as an apartment-warming gift to Trap's swinging bachelor pad. But Hawkeye wanted something classy, so he had asked B.J. to pick him something up from the Wine Country, a couple hours north of Mill Valley to Napa Valley.

"Are you gonna get him drunk and have your way with him?" B.J. had asked when Hawkeye called with the request.

"Well, that depends on the vintage."

"Yours or the wine's?"

"Mostly Trapper's."

"Hawk."

"I am a married man, Sir!" Hawkeye put on his best indignant voice.

"I didn't mean singular you."

"Oh." That had thrown Hawkeye enough to, for once, take away his words. The thing with him and Trapper ended soon after Henry Blake died, although they hadn't known that the last time they saw each other in Korea would be the last time. Then B.J. came along and there was the thing with him. And then Hawkeye and B.J. went home to different ends of the country and then Margaret re-entered Hawkeye's life. And he'd been, to everyone's surprise, including his own, 100% faithful to her. No woman could compare to her, all he had with her. Not that there were many temptations, or much privacy, in his hometown anyway. As for the male temptations, no one could compare to Trapper or B.J., and he had long ago accepted that they were going home to their wives.

Trapper was wife-less now, but Hawkeye wasn't. That his wife had once had a yen for Trapper didn't matter. She didn't stray either. But B.J. suggesting some sort of group thing, maybe out of teasing, maybe out of jealousy, maybe out of concern, that threw Hawkeye.

It wasn't that the idea had never ever crossed his mind. But not in fifteen years. He and Trapper had never shared a woman simultaneously, but they had both been with Margie Cutler and other nurses at different times. They'd both lusted after Hot Lips Houlihan but she only slept with generals over 50 and the Lipless Wonder. (That nickname came courtesy of Frank's girlfriend, when she was gorgeously drunk.) Her landing in bed with Hawkeye or Trapper was unlikely then, let alone with both. Come to think of it, Hawkeye hadn't actually been in bed with her until '54, as opposed to mating in the dirt out of fear and comfort as much as desire.

It had been a nice fantasy though, one that he sometimes wondered if Trap shared, although he never dared ask. Hawkeye had absolutely never spoken of or even hinted at it to B.J., who had seemed relatively innocent, especially in his early days, before Carrie Donovan. For Beej to come out with this now— as a tease, an accusation, a warning?— definitely was startling.

Before Hawkeye could find any words besides "Oh," B.J. moved the phone away from his mouth and asked, "Honey, do you want to hit the wineries this weekend?" Apparently this was no longer a private conversation.

The Hunnicutts did bring back a fine wine, not that Hawkeye was any connoisseur. Charles Winchester was a bit of a wine snob, along with all his other snobberies, and he probably would've turned up his nose at "Yountville's Finest," but it looked good enough for Trapper, who wasn't any fussier about hooch than Hawkeye.

And judging by the crooked grin on the face of the man in faded blue jeans and a Beethoven sweatshirt, the wine was good enough.


	5. Undisciplined

Even though they'd visited Trapper during his separation, Margaret wasn't thinking of how he'd looked in '65 but rather how he appeared fifteen years before that, when they were all new to the 4077th. It was her second war. She'd been a young nurse during The Big One and now she was a not so young nurse in this police action. She'd stayed in the Army in the "peacetime" years of the late '40s. It was really the only life she knew, especially since she was a proud Army brat.

She loved discipline, control, sanity. Her mother was an alcoholic and a kleptomaniac, although they used more polite language to describe it then, her mother's "little problems." Margaret learned as a little girl that if everything was in order, then it would fight back the chaos. She thought in military terms even then, eager to win her father's approval. But she wasn't the firstborn son he wanted and she wasn't cute little "Victory." So she constantly had to keep proving herself, until she gave up on it and decided to be herself and think about what she really wanted, even if that included life with a man her father despised. It was all right, she had other, better father figures, Colonel Potter and her father-in-law.

Captain McIntyre was, despite two little daughters he adored, not in the slightest degree fatherly, and not just because Margaret was slightly older. He was, although she couldn't admit this when she was sober, gorgeous and sexy. That curly blond hair and that crooked smile. Those shoulders, chest, arms, and legs.

And there he was, out of uniform, unshaven, no sirs, no salute, no nothing. She hated that she was attracted to him. This wasn't her type, what the hell was wrong with her?

To make it worse, there were two of him. Not that he and Pierce were twins. Pierce had wavy black hair and a glint in his blue eye. He was almost as tall but skinny, especially in those early days when he could barely stomach anything from the mess tent and would get weird cravings, like for stateside ribs. But they were a team, from the very beginning. So there were two of them out of uniform, unshaven, lacking in respect and discipline. (Well, sometimes there were three of them, but Captains Jones and Spalding were never as bad and neither was around that long.)

She turned to Frank Burns, the sort of man who was one of her types. Patriotic and disciplined, but with a wild side to match her own. Yes, he was married, but he would sometimes say he'd leave his wife, and it was clear he didn't love Louise, just her money and her respectability. So Margaret ignored that he was a no-lip, chalk-skinned, sniveling lipless wonder, and worse than that, a cowardly incompetent. And all the time, she couldn't get over McIntyre or Pierce.

With McIntyre, it was just basic lust, but Pierce, damn him, made her smile and even laugh despite herself. Both men were top surgeons, but Pierce was the very best. Also, he and she lasted the war long enough to get to know each other as people.

Nowadays, McIntyre was one of her husband's best friends. She was still aware of his good looks, but in a more abstract way. When very faithful Peg had giggled like her teenage daughter as she whispered on the phone, "Why didn't you tell me how handsome Trapper is?", it had startled Margaret. She'd gotten used to his sexiness, but it had obviously taken Peg by surprise when he first came over for dinner in Mill Valley. And Peg had seen the wedding pictures and other photos of McIntyre, but cameras couldn't do justice to his charisma. Still, for Peg it was like having a movie star to her house. She'd never been and never would be seriously tempted by Trapper.

Margaret noticed that Trapper was growing his hair out a little. It was longer but thinner than it'd been in Korea. He had sideburns now. He was as handsome as ever in middle age. She felt a little guilty for these thoughts, but she was aware that she wasn't the one who had had sex with this man.

When she and Hawkeye got together for good, they agreed that the past was the past. Neither of them were virgins, physically or emotionally, and what they had gone through, who they had been in bed with and/or loved, made up part of who they were, but the past was over in the sense that they would do their best to be faithful from here on out. Attractions weren't held against them, although actions would've been. So Hawkeye seeing "his exes" was never cause for concern.

Trapper's divorce shouldn't make any difference. Even if he and Hawkeye bantered and flirted like in the old days, it didn't matter. She trusted Ben and, to be honest, the two men were pretty cute together, especially now that she wasn't expecting military discipline and respect.

As Trapper took the bottle of wine that B.J. had bought for them as an apartment-warming gift and he and Hawkeye joked about the Still, she noticed he was in sloppy clothes, a sweatshirt and jeans, but his apartment was far neater and cleaner than the Swamp had ever been. She never got to see the doctors' tent before "Piercintyre" trashed it.

"Hello, Nurse!" the black-haired slob leered when she first walked in, although she was in her uniform rather than her scrubs.

The blond slob leaned over and whispered something to him of which Margaret caught the phrase "bedside manner."

She struggled not to blush or fume.

The man on the other side of the room jumped to his feet and said, "You must be Major Houlihan. Major Burns, Ma'am." He saluted her so she saluted back.

"It's a major encounter," the brunet slob said.

This time the blond's whispered phrase that caught her ear was "labia majora." She felt like running out of the tent but stood her ground.

"On your feet, Men, and acknowledge your superior officer!" Major Burns barked.

"I'd get up, Honey," the blond slob said, flashing a crooked smile at her, "but the room is spinning."

That time the brunet leaned over and audibly whispered, "Well, part of me is ready to stand and salute."

The blond snickered and Margaret stormed out. Major Burns went after her and the two of them vented about the horrible captains he was forced to room with. (Captain Jones had stepped out to get more booze, she later discovered.)

"...But I guess it's one of the hazards of war," Burns concluded, trying to look stoic.

"You're so stalwart!" she said. And that was the beginning of falling in love with him.

In the next 24 hours, however, she'd seen the doctors in the operating room and was forced to rethink things a little. Burns was less impressive than she hoped, although she had stars in her eyes for the next few months that prevented her from seeing clearly how bungling he could be. And the two slobs turned out to be wonderful at surgery, if rude and crude in their demeanor in the OR. It seemed such a waste, although she was grateful that they were much better doctors than soldiers. Maybe under her influence, and Major Burns's, they could shape up. Not that the majors would get any support from the commanding officer, but they would circumvent Colonel Blake if need be. She had many general friends, or "friends in general" as the black-haired slob would pun to her later.

"Do you mind if I take off my sweatshirt? It's a gift from Kathy and I don't want to spill wine on it."

Hawkeye shrugged. "Hey, it's your place. You can drink in the nude if you want."

"Thanks, Hawk. Margaret?" Trapper looked at her with those warm hazel eyes and she remembered once being trapped in the supply tent with him. She'd resisted then and she would resist now.

"I prefer you leave your pants on."

Both men chuckled and Trapper said, "Whatever you want, Honey." Then he pulled off his sweatshirt to reveal an undershirt. His shoulders, chest, and arms were as muscular as ever.

She bit her lower lip and thought that this was going to be a very long weekend.


	6. Hate Like Love

As Trapper went to get wine glasses from the kitchen, he of course thought of his guests in the living room and whether either of them were ogling him from behind. But he was also thinking about his most recent phone conversation with B.J.

"Last weekend, Peg and I had a nice romantic getaway in the Wine Country."

Trapper didn't ask for details. They didn't have that sort of friendship, and Trapper already knew what it was like to have a romantic weekend with the wife away from the kids, although not recently. It wasn't like the days of hearing about Hawkeye's bachelor misadventures. He just asked what wineries they went to. And B.J., who was sneakier than he looked, with or without a mustache, didn't drop a hint that he'd been buying a bottle for Trapper. (Hawkeye reimbursed him of course.)

Trapper also thought about a conversation he and B.J. had a few years ago, when they were good enough friends to discuss the friendly competition they had about who was Hawkeye's best friend.

"He drove all the way to Kimpo to see you off, against Frank's orders."

Trapper had shrugged nonchalantly. "Defying Frank was second nature to us. That doesn't count." Then he chuckled. "Hawk told me you called Frank 'Ferret Face' the first time you met him."

B.J. had shrugged modestly. "I just wanted to fit in."

"Oh, you fit in all right."

"Listen, I know you felt replaced or whatever, but you know Hawk. He's very intense. He hates and loves quickly."

"Or in Hot Lips's case, hate-loves quickly."

Both men laughed that time.

Then B.J. got more serious and said, "It's not easy being second either. Hearing about the legendary Trapper John McIntyre all the time."

Trapper snorted. "I may've been legendary among the nurses, but it's not like we were in competition there."

"No," B.J. said softly.

Hawkeye had dropped a few hints over the years that B.J. had strayed once or twice. Trapper hadn't asked for details there either. From what he knew of B.J., Hunnicutt probably beat himself up about it. It wasn't like he could've just had his fun and seen it as separate from his marriage, like Trapper and Henry and some of the other married guys could.

Trapper also knew that B.J., despite the nickname that had cracked Trapper up the first time he read it, had never had sex with Hawkeye, not even close. They had a more cuddly although also more argumentative relationship. Big fights, then sweet makeups. Trapper just wasn't into drama, with anyone. Hawkeye was, which could be both exhausting and entertaining.

Trapper had felt jealous and rejected for a few years, even if he was the one who left, even though it had felt so good to go home to his wife, daughters, and practice. He just missed Hawkeye and knew he would never meet anyone like him again. And he had desperately wanted to say goodbye to Hawk. It had killed him to fly away without that, and it hurt even more when he later found out that the clean-cut guy in the fresh uniform that he ran by on the runway was his replacement, in more ways than one.

But B.J. had been jealous, too, jealous of the past. That made Trapper feel a little better, to understand that. And eventually the two men realized they were adults and Hawkeye could have more than one best friend, more than one "boyfriend" if you wanted to call it that. And it turned out that they actually liked each other.

"Not like I liked you," Trapper told Hawkeye once. "I mean, I guess he's handsome, even with a mustache." (It was less droopy these days at least.) "But more like a brother I guess."

Hawkeye had nodded. "That's what Margaret says. She loves him in a sisterly way."

"While she hated me in a non-sisterly way."

"She never hated you. She hated us and not consistently."

Trapper shook his head. But he of course knew that she was usually anywhere from annoyed to hostile towards the two of them in those early days, while still having her moments of admitting her attraction. Always drunk moments in his case, while with Hawkeye and her, you had to read between the lines. As for Trapper, well, he once called her a "creepess" when Hawkeye called Frank a "creep," but not to their faces. Looking back, Trapper got along better with Frank than Hawkeye did, partly because Trapper didn't get as emotionally invested in things as Hawkeye did, and Frank could be nice if you were nice to him— "It's nice to be nice to the nice," he'd once babbled— while Hawkeye and Hot Lips seemed to thrive on their clashes. Even now that they were married, well, they weren't exactly the Bickersons, but Trapper had seen them argue as a couple, sometimes over patients, sometimes over their household, and there were sparks bouncing off the Craftsman walls.

It was pretty sexy, much sexier than the ugly fights he and Louise had, although Trapper mostly kept that opinion to himself. He knew that B.J. had been rooting for Hawkeye and Margaret to become a couple at least since he met Donald Penobscott, or maybe since he met Hawkeye and Hot Lips, and he would've been the perfect best man at her second wedding if the timing hadn't been awful. (Poor Peg had a miscarriage a few days before the wedding, so Trapper was drafted, more pleasantly than in '50.) Back in Korea, Trapper had just been hoping that Hawk would get Hot Lips in the sack and then tell him all about it, because he had a feeling that it wasn't going to happen for him, despite his mutual lust for her.

Trapper wasn't going to live vicariously through the Pierces, as he had the feeling lonely B.J. had back when Hawkeye and Margaret were (mostly) single. But he again thought of his bachelor bed and hoped they would break it in without breaking it.

He came back to the living room with the wine glasses and saw Hawkeye reading the label on the bottle. "Do you want to pop the cork?" Trapper asked and, even though he didn't say it at all suggestively, Margaret blushed and Hawkeye laughed that big, beautiful, crazy laugh of his. Trapper grinned.


	7. Influences

"So what should we drink to?" Trapper asked after he'd poured wine into all three glasses.

Hawkeye almost said, "To your divorce," but he knew that would be tacky. An image floated through his mind of a scarlet woman, glowing with the joy of her decision to divorce her first husband.

Trapper seemed to sense Hawkeye's hesitation, because he said, "Why don't we toast to Radar? The man, not the technology."

Hawkeye smiled. "Yeah, everybody likes Radar."

Margaret mumbled, "Frank."

"I am not toasting to Needle Nose!" Hawkeye exclaimed, making Trapper chuckle.

"No, I mean Frank didn't and probably still doesn't like Radar."

"Who did Frank like? Besides you and MacArthur."

"He liked me sometimes," Trapper said.

Hawkeye laughed. "Yeah, he adored you."

"It's true, he liked Trapper better than you. He told me, after Trapper went home, that he wished it had been you."

Hawkeye blinked. She'd never told him that before. It was understandable that she wouldn't have said anything at the time, when she was the acting C.O.'s right-hand woman, meaning she was the power behind Frank's tacky little throne in the interregnum between Blake and Potter. But she'd been Hawkeye's wife for a dozen years! How had this never come up before?

Trapper looked a lot less surprised. "Yeah, I had a few conversations with Frank where I talked to him like he was a human being. And I think he thought you were the ringleader and I would've been manageable without your corrupting influence."

Hawkeye shook his head. "You were just as deep in our mischief and misdemeanors as I was."

"I was your sidekick, Hawk. A willing sidekick but still a sidekick." Trapper said it without judgement, as if he'd long ago accepted this.

"And look how you corrupted poor B.J.," Margaret added.

"Poor B.J.?! You know he's not as innocent as he looks!"

"Yes, but from Frank's perspective, that was your fault."

"Yeah, I saw the guy when he stepped off the plane. I didn't know who he was of course, but I pieced it together later. Clean-cut, clean-shaven, crisp new captain's uniform, a nervous smile on his face."

"And by the time you brought him to the 4077th, he was drunk and disheveled and disrespectful."

"Nice alliteration," Trapper said.

"Thank you."

"That wasn't my fault! Well, OK, the drunk part was, but the poor kid had been thrown into battlefield medicine without warning. He threw up and then he kept going." That had been when Hawkeye started to fall in love with B.J., although at the time he was mostly thinking how useless Frank would've been in that situation. "I had to take him to Rosie's after that."

"Meanwhile, Radar carried a girl out of a minefield and didn't need anything stronger than a grape Nehi to recover."

Trapper held up his glass. "To Radar!"

Margaret smiled. "To Radar."

Hawkeye sighed. "To Radar."

The three of them clinked glasses and took sips.

"Good wine," Margaret murmured.

"Yeah, B.J. has good taste," Trapper said, looking at Hawkeye.

Hawkeye thought of the StarKist commercials and almost said something about B.J. tasting good, but there was no way to make that just a harmless joke. So he just smiled a little.

Trapper took another sip and then asked, "So, what do you two want to do this weekend? I can give you a tour of Frisco if you want, although I'm still getting my bearings myself."

"We've been here before," Margaret pointed out. "With the Hunnicutts."

"Ah, but have they taken you to the Hate?"

Hawkeye repeated, "The Hate?" It sounded Orwellian to him, and not his idea of a fun weekend.

"H-A-I-G-H-T."

"Oh, Haight-Ashbury."

Trapper looked at Margaret in surprise. "You've heard of it?"

"I read about it in _Newsweek_. Apparently it's a hotbed of bohemians."

Both men laughed at her phrasing, although Hawkeye figured she was probably directly quoting the magazine. He had heard about teenage runaways and beatniks and miscellaneous misfits heading for the West Coast, and not just for the surfing, but it wasn't really, well, on his radar as yet. He was more aware of the campus strife that was slowly starting to bubble up as things got sticky in Vietnam.

"Yeah, that's where the hippies live," Trapper said. "I got that tapestry from one of their shops." He pointed at a brightly colored weaving hanging on the wall of what otherwise appeared to be a bachelor pad straight out of _Playboy_ , from its state-of-the art hi-fi stereo system to its black & yellow shag rug. The couch that the Pierces were sitting on was dark brown and modular. Trap surprisingly didn't have the obligatory wet bar, which was why he'd had to go into the kitchen for wine glasses.

"It's pretty," Margaret said, but Hawkeye could tell she was being polite. She preferred order and sense in art as in so much of life. Well, not always in their marriage, fortunately.

"Thanks." Hawkeye could also tell that Trapper knew she was just being polite but he was going to let it go.

"So what else have you bought from the 'hippies'? Any reefer?"

Hawkeye was joking but Trapper glanced at Margaret before scoffing, "Yeah, right."

Margaret looked at both of them but instead of rolling her eyes, she said, "Let's just stick to wine for now."

Trapper chuckled and then said, "Margaret, you didn't use to joke in the old days. I think he's been a bad influence on you."

She shrugged. "At least I don't pun."

"Give me another sixteen years," Hawkeye said.

"We'll see," she said and then took another sip of wine.

Trapper had once asked Hawkeye, "How do you flirt with your wife like that? I mean, I know how to do the 'come to bed' kind of flirting, but this 1930s-movie banter? I'd expect it from you, but Margaret?"

Hawkeye had shrugged. "I don't know. She picked it up pretty easy once we became more relaxed with each other."

Hawkeye supposed it was stranger for Trapper to observe than for B.J., who'd seen later phases of his evolving relationship with Major Houlihan. Plus, B.J. himself had a lighter touch than Trapper. From the first day they met in Kimpo, they were making literary and movie jokes and less of the cruder humor that Trapper excelled at. Hawkeye liked both obviously, but maybe he'd needed to make that shift, especially in the wake of Henry's death and all the other changes that had happened after that first crazy year in Korea.

"You don't have to take us anywhere, Trapper," Margaret said. "But thank you."

"So you wanna just sit around my apartment, getting drunk and watching TV?"

"Please, no TV," Hawkeye objected. "My dad has it on all the time he's home, even with summer reruns. I was hoping to get the _Gilligan's Island_ theme out of my head for a few days."

"Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale...," Trapper began.

Hawkeye shook his head and Margaret laughed.

Trapper asked, "Do you remember that time we got drunk?"

"Uh, you're going to have to narrow it down a little. To a continent and a decade at least, preferably a town and a day."

"Sometime in the Spring of '51, downtown Swamp. And I meant the three of us got drunk."

Hawkeye grinned and Margaret blushed. Of course he remembered, and she obviously did, too. "Yeah, when Frank passed the 18th Amendment."

"It was fun," Margaret said quietly. "Singing and laughing."

"Hey," Trapper said, "you were welcome to get drunk with us every night."

"Frank guilt-tripped me enough as it was."

Hawkeye was thinking about how human she had seemed that night. So often, she'd tried to act like a humorless martinet, and certainly she had that side to her, even now. He'd treasured those glimpses of the warm, fun woman underneath. He also remembered another night of laughing with her in Korea, although then it'd been more a matter of tiredness. He now quoted, "The sulfa's in the living room."

Trapper looked at his couch in confusion. "What?"

"She does pun, sometimes."

"Only under extreme circumstances," Margaret demurred.

"Really?" Trapper sounded intrigued, like he'd just found out the color of her panties. Hawkeye supposed that Trap had been charmed by those human glimpses, too.

"Do you still have your guitar?" she asked.

"Yeah, you want me to go get it?"

"It might be fun."

Trapper set down his wine glass on the oval Scandinavian teak coffee table. "I'll be right back."

Far from the first time, Hawkeye looked at his wife in surprise, wondering what exactly was on her mind. Maybe just a three-person jamboree, but probably something more.


	8. In Vino

Margaret wasn't planning to try to recapture their lost youth (well, their early 30s) by recreating the night of "Come on in, take off your skin...." They weren't the same people they were then, she in particular. They had children and different marital statuses and even their jobs were different in peacetime. (She counted this as peacetime, despite Vietnam. This Asian war hadn't touched her life in the same way Korea had.) But she didn't see any harm in getting a little drunk with her husband and one of his best friends.

As for the guitar, while Trapper was no Captain Spalding, he could play some, a talent that his son apparently had inherited. It would feel more festive with a sing-along. And this time, there was zero chance of an indignant Major Burns storming in and out of the room.

"Captain Spalding was the one who taught him to play, right?" she asked Hawkeye while Trapper was getting the guitar out of his bedroom.

Hawkeye burst into a Groucho Marx song, "Hooray for Captain Spaulding, the African explorer!"

Trapper came back with his guitar and said, "Did someone call me Schnorrer?"

"Hooray, hooray, hooray!"

"Who was Schnorrer?" Margaret asked. She'd always wondered.

Her husband answered, "It's Yiddish for 'moocher.' "

"Oh." She took another sip of wine.

"You want me to do some more Top Forty from the Roaring Twenties?" Trapper offered as he sat down.

"Toot, toot, Tootsie, goodbye!" Hawkeye sang in reply.

So they sang that and "Yes, We Have No Bananas" and some other songs from their childhoods. She thought of how their own children would've rolled their eyes if they'd been present. She then guiltily thought that it would be nice to spend a little time apart from her son, much as she loved him. And Hawkeye was right, Larry would be safe with the Hunnicutts.

They weren't getting drunk as fast as they had that one night in Korea. Maybe it was that they were older, or maybe it was that there was less urgency now.

"I'm not so think as you drunk I am."

Margaret blushed at her husband quoting her, from one of the first times she got drunk out of frustration with her life. She was getting no respect from anyone, including Frank, who was stringing her along. And it was starting to dawn on her that the Korean War wasn't the noble exercise in patriotism that World War II had been. Hawkeye and Trapper had been sober but amused that night, as they, on Blake's orders, tried to sober her up. The details were fuzzy the next day and even fuzzier more than fifteen years later, but she knew that "the boys" had taken her into the women's showers, fully dressed, and dunked her, while she laughed and flirted with Trapper. Ben would bring it up now and again, to tease her, but this was the first time since '50 that he'd mentioned it in front of Trapper. It was a more embarrassing memory for her than the one of getting drunk with the two of them, but she was used to Hawkeye's teasing by now of course.

Trapper laughed as if he remembered that night perfectly. She wondered what he thought now about her flirting with him then. Oh, and the night she got drunk at his "going-away" party where he ended up not leaving just yet. He'd surprisingly been a gentleman, not taking it further than slow dancing. The times he'd gotten fresh with her, they'd both been sober.

She didn't regret that nothing had happened between them. Frank would've been furious for one thing, and she didn't need that drama. And it wasn't as if it would've meant anything to Trapper, other than sex and maybe triumph at "bagging the bitch." At least when it happened with Hawkeye, they'd started to understand and respect each other, and Frank was gone. (Of course, she was married to Donald, and that was a completely different complication, especially when her pregnancy scare came along.)

But in a different world, under different circumstances, yeah, a roll in the hay with Trapper would've been nice.

Trapper stopped strumming after "Singin' in the Rain" and said surprisingly seriously, yet with a twinkle in his hazel eye, "If I confess to something, can I blame it on the wine?"

"In vino veritas," Hawkeye replied.

"Hey, I didn't know you knew Latin," Trapper teased.

"I picked it up in med school. Along with, well, I can't say in front of the little woman."

She rolled her eyes and then said, "What were you going to say, Trapper?" She doubted he'd admit to still lusting after either of them, but she was curious.

"I did buy pot in the Haight."

Hawkeye gasped and then said, "I wish Klinger were here so I could borrow his pearls to clutch."

"Weren't you worried about being arrested?" Margaret said. "You never know when an undercover cop might be posing as a 'hippie.' "

Trapper shook his head. "It's getting so you can't shock anyone anymore." He launched into "Anything Goes," which none of them pointed out was from the '30s rather than the '20s.

Hawkeye and Margaret both joined in, but afterwards Ben asked, "So why the confession? Just to get Hot Lips to put you on report? Or were you being a good host and offering some of your stash?"

Trapper shrugged. "I don't know. I guess I wanted to see what you thought of it."

She said, "According to some studies, it's no more harmful than alcohol, which is not to say alcohol is harmless of course."

"Yeah, I've got the ulcer to prove that."

He'd developed the ulcer in Korea, partly from drinking and partly from stress, because even easy-going Trapper John had felt the stress of war. Hawkeye told him that the ulcer would be a ticket home, which was why there'd been a premature goodbye party, but the Army just wanted him to get treatment and then go to another unit. So he stayed a few months longer.

"But it is illegal."

"So was operating a still in a war zone."

"True, but, no, I'm not going to report you for this."

"Well, thanks."

Hawkeye had been silent a relatively long time for him but he now spoke up to say, "What's it like?"

Trapper closed his eyes. "It's different every time. I've done it maybe half a dozen times, so I'm no expert. I usually feel light-headed at first. Things are funnier, in a different way than when you're drunk. You can't think as clearly of course, so I'd never do it when I'm working. But to relax at home? It's probably no more mind-numbing than television."

Ben looked at her and asked, "Would you divorce me if I tried it?"

"I don't give up that easy." It was now second nature to fall into that movie-like banter with him, but she meant it.

Trapper opened his eyes and stared at his best friend. "Wait a minute, Hawk. You want the two of us to get stoned while she gets high the legal way?"

Margaret set down her glass. "I don't want any more wine." She was a little tipsy but certainly not sloshed, and she wanted a relatively clear head if the boys were going to try marijuana. They, especially her husband, might not react well to the drug, particularly on top of wine, and she might need to intervene medically. Also, while the "trips" from marijuana were supposed to be less extreme than those from LSD (which would become illegal in California four months later), it would be good to have someone in the room hold onto their sanity.

"You want some pot?" Trapper teased.

"No thank you," she said as if he were offering a tempting but fattening hors d'oeuvre.

"Suit yourself," he said, then set down his guitar and went back in his bedroom.

"Are you sure you're OK with this?" Ben whispered.

She nodded. "I won't tell General Clayton."

He laughed and then gave her a quick kiss on the lips. "Thanks, Baby, I owe you."

She didn't tell him that watching him and one of his best friends under a different influence than usual would be reward enough, for entertainment and medical purposes. She just said, "I know."


	9. Grok

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Contains a reference to _House Calls_ , which I've also never watched.

As Trapper rolled the joints in his bedroom, he reminded himself that he would need to do a good job of hiding his drug paraphernalia before his twelve-year-old son arrived in a week. Maybe he'd stash his stash with a doctor he knew who worked at another hospital. Charley Michaels was also new to Frisco but in his mid-30s. Trapper didn't know him well but he had the feeling Charley would understand.

Trapper hesitated before rolling a third joint. Margaret had declined it but perhaps she'd change her mind, especially after watching him and her husband toke up. She had changed a lot in fifteen or sixteen years, but he wasn't sure how much, and he'd never been able to read her as well as Hawkeye could.

Her hair wasn't showing any gray yet, but it was platinum blonde rather than the honey blonde he still preferred. She used to wear it straight and long or sometimes in a more military/nursely bun back then, but now it was in a cute flip, a bit bouffanty on top. She still had a great figure and, while she wasn't wearing a miniskirt, the hemline was short enough that he'd caught some great glimpses of her legs while she was sitting on his couch. Hawkeye was a butt man, primarily, while Trapper had a thing for legs. They'd always agreed on her breasts, which were still damn perky for a woman somewhere in her 40s, although they and she didn't stand at attention like in her Hot Lips days.

As for Hawkeye, the raven-black of his hair was heading towards dove, and there were crow's feet near his eyes, but Hawk was still a handsome devil. Not as rail-thin as in the early '50s but still fit and trim. And those eyes, still that piercing Pierce blue!

Trapper's attraction to both Pierces didn't surprise him of course. It wasn't like he'd ever stopped being attracted to them. But he'd learned to deal with it long ago, and being divorced didn't make any difference. He doubted anything would happen that weekend, since nothing had happened with Hawkeye in fifteen years, and nothing much had ever happened with Margaret. On the other hand, if something did happen, even if it was just kissing, he certainly wouldn't object. The thing was, he, unlike Hawkeye in his bachelor days, hardly ever got too worked up about whether he was going to get to first base or more with anyone. OK, there was Margie Cutler, but that had more to do with a friendly competition with Hawkeye than with Margie herself.

Trapper certainly didn't mind that Hawkeye had "won" Hot Lips, both in Korea and back home. She was too clingy for Trapper's taste and, while Frank managed to string her along for a year without getting divorced, Trapper didn't think he could've managed it. He preferred women who took sex as casually as he did. However, he could see how he hypothetically could've fallen for her, and definitely how she could've fallen for him. That wasn't his ego. That was her own drunken confessions of attraction, which maybe could've grown into something bigger under the right circumstances. That was one reason he never seriously pursued her, although of course he hadn't wanted to deal with Frank's whiny anger either.

His own dislike of her as a person then had also helped him keep his distance. He'd been skeptical of Hawkeye's letters at first, relating her evolution after Trapper's departure. But gradually he believed that war was finally changing her. He did tease Hawkeye, "Are you falling for that hard-ass dame?" But Hawkeye denied it of course, claimed it was just a growing friendship and respect. And he never told Trapper at the time about the night he was inside her as bombs fell around them.

Hawkeye still claimed to this day that he wasn't in love with his wife. "Not like I was with you, or B.J., or Carlye and a few other women. It's something different and maybe bigger than that kind of love. It's like she's a lens I see the world through, while still having my own point of view.

Trapper didn't get it. He loved his kids like crazy, and he still loved Hawkeye, and there had been people in his life he'd loved less but still importantly, like Henry and Radar, but love didn't define him.

"Do you get them?" he asked B.J. a month ago, while Peg was cooking dinner.

"Do I dig them, as Erin would say? In the 'understand' rather than 'like' sense."

"I know you like them, separately and as a couple. But, yeah, do you grok them?"

B.J. chuckled. "Yes and no. He and I talked a lot about her, in a different way than you two probably did. But for an egocentric, Hawkeye has a lot of blind spots about himself. I don't think he groks them either." B.J. shrugged and continued, "They are what they are, contradictions and all. But it seems to work for them."

Trapper nodded and didn't say that it had never really worked for him and Louise, now Melanie. Yeah, in bed but not really elsewhere, and bed had been the easiest part to replace when he was away from her. But he stayed with her after his return, for the sake of the kids, until the kids were adolescents and she said enough was enough.

He sighed and decided to put the extra joint in his pocket. If Margaret didn't want it, he might smoke it himself.

He went back to the living room and saw the Pierces still sitting close together on his couch. He thought yet again of the night they all got drunk together. "Ben and Margaret" weren't the "them" then. It was him and Hawk, partners in crime, breaking Prohibition and other silly rules of Frank's, that night with an unexpected ally. It was different now. They were the Pierces. He was the outsider, no matter what his history with Hawkeye. He'd do well to remember that.

"Will it matter that I've never smoked cigarettes?" Hawkeye asked.

Trapper smiled. There'd always been something naive and innocent about Hawkeye, despite the veneer of cynicism. Trapper hadn't been entirely kidding when he called Captain Pierce a kid, although he of course wasn't as innocent and untouched as Captain Hunnicutt would be a year later.

"Just watch and learn, Kid," Trapper said as he sat down and took out his lighter.


	10. Joint Experimentation

Hawkeye watched one of his best friends "light up a joint," and wondered if this would seem even weirder to him if he were sober. It wasn't as strange as if it were B.J. of course, but it was odd. Hawkeye wondered how much had to do with the divorce and the move across country, or if all of these were just a series of changes in Trapper's life.

But maybe it was stranger that he himself was going to try pot, with his level-headed if sometimes overly emotional wife looking on. He'd heard about marijuana for years but no one had ever offered him any, not even during his residency. He'd never been curious enough to seek it out. He was old-fashioned in some ways and booze had always been enough for him, although he certainly drank less at home than at the 4077th. Even these sips of wine were more than he'd had in weeks.

He wasn't sure what he was expecting from pot. Maybe it would mostly be like getting drunk. But he wanted to know what it was like, to be able to say he'd tried it once.

It did occur to him that at some point, maybe in five years if not sooner, he'd have to talk to his by then adolescent son about drugs. He didn't know what he'd say to Larry but at least he wouldn't be speaking from a position of total ignorance. To be honest, the sex talk would probably be easier. At least Hawkeye knew a lot about sex and had almost always felt comfortable talking about it.

An image floated through his slightly hazy brain of Henry Blake trying to give a birds & bees talk to his now 15-year-old son. Hawkeye had to grin.

"Does this amuse you?" Trapper asked after he took a puff.

Hawkeye shook his head. "I was just thinking of Henry."

Trapper chuckled. "Can you imagine Henry on dope?"

Even Margaret laughed at that. "He was an amusing drunk."

"Takes one to know one, Baby," Hawkeye teased.

She shook her head.

When Trapper had returned to the room, he chose the brown chair near Hawkeye's end of the couch, rather than the one across from the couch. So it was now easy for him to hold out the joint to Hawkeye. "You want a hit?"

"I don't get my own?"

"It's more friendly to share."

Hawkeye wondered who Trapper had shared with. He'd been picturing Trapper as being a loner since the divorce. But he just said, "OK," and accepted the joint.

"Inhale slowly," Trapper advised, so Hawkeye did. It still burned his throat a little as he took it in. He coughed.

Margaret gently patted his back. "Are you OK?"

"I think so." He blinked. "How long before it takes effect?"

Trapper chuckled again. "Give it time. Oh, and by the way, Margaret, you might get what they call a contact high from being in the room."

"I'll take that risk," she said.

Hawkeye knew she could've said she'd go in the bedroom and unpack, or otherwise excused herself from the room. He wondered if she was staying out of curiosity or protectiveness. Perhaps both. He wanted her here, even as an observer. Even though she seldom got indignant or self-righteous anymore, rebellion was still more interesting, more fun, with her to watch.

He passed the joint back to Trapper, who inhaled slowly himself, but like he had all the time in the world. He'd always been much more laidback than Hawkeye, even when they were both drunk. Marijuana was supposed to relax you, but Hawkeye couldn't imagine Trapper much more relaxed. He wondered if his own intensity would be blunted by the drug, and if that would be a good or bad thing.

In a different way than Margaret, Hawkeye liked being in control, of others and more importantly of self. Even the times he acted "crazy," whether barging into peace talks or firing a string of wordplay at hapless victims, these were attempts to take charge, to bring order out of chaos, if in a less by-the-book way than Margaret.

Trapper passed the joint back and Hawkeye inhaled again, trying to focus on the experience, even as his mind wandered.

"I feel a little tingly," Margaret murmured.

The men grinned at each other and then at her. 

"Oh?" Hawkeye teased, making her blush. He used to say outrageous things to get a reaction out of her, but now that they were so intimate, in every way, he could get to her with a syllable and one raised eyebrow.

"I mean my knees and elbows."

"Well, it is a joint," he had to pun, making Trapper snort.

"I think she's feeling it more than you are."

Hawkeye took another puff and then breathed out the smoke. Then he leaned over and kissed Margaret on the lips. She opened her mouth to receive his tongue. As they soul-kissed, he wondered if he tasted like marijuana.

"Wow, leave it to Hawkeye Pierce to combine French-kissing with illicit drug use."

The Pierces broke apart, she blushing more, and he laughing.

"Sorry," he said, "that was a little rude of me."

Trapper shrugged. "I've seen you do worse."

Now Hawkeye blushed a little, too, remembering times that he and Trapper brought nurses back to the Swamp while the other slept, or at least pretended to. He held the marijuana cigarette out for Trapper's next turn.

As Trapper reached for the joint, Margaret teased, "Ben, you're not going to pass it on to him like you did with me?"

She'd never seen him kiss Trapper. Flirt with Trapper of course. Lie next to Trapper in her bed, yeah, that one time for a joke. She had seen him kiss B.J., he learned a couple years afterwards. It was the night after her pregnancy scare was resolved and she'd wanted to talk to him. She saw the two Swampmates kissing in bed. When she told him, she described herself as having been mostly shocked about it being two men she thought she knew well. Not that he'd ever pretended to be 100% heterosexual, but his heterosexual side was firmly established enough that he could joke in public about his homosexual side.

He wondered how she would've reacted if it'd been Trapper she'd seen him kissing. Of course, if she'd had a pregnancy scare back then, she certainly wouldn't have confided in Hawkeye. It'd been hard enough for her to come to him and Trapper the night a general died in her bed, and that had been because she couldn't have told Frank and she had to do something about it immediately. If she'd gotten pregnant by that general, or another, she presumably would've made Henry give her a three-day pass for Seoul or Tokyo, without telling anyone at the 4077th the reason why.

"Would you like to see that, Margaret?" Trapper teased after an awkward pause, pulling Hawkeye out of his thoughts of how Margaret would've coped with the possibility of an out-of-wedlock pregnancy.

She shrugged. "It's probably a more pleasant form of ingestion."

Now Trapper leaned forward to reach past Hawkeye and hold the joint out to her. "Why don't you compare them yourself?"

It was like they were playing a blend of Truth or Dare and Spin the Bottle, adolescent games for three middle-aged medical professionals. Margaret had often called Hawkeye immature when he was in his 30s, and he knew she considered Trapper equally immature then. She saw herself as the grown-up at the 4077th, until Colonel Potter came along and she could let herself be playful more often. He wondered how playful she felt this night.

She raised her eyebrows but then said, "All right." Hawkeye wasn't sure if she was implying, _I will, if you will_ , but she took the joint as if willing to go first. She put the joint to her pink, pretty, sometimes hot lips and carefully inhaled. Hawkeye found it subtly erotic, not at all to his surprise.

"Well?" Trapper asked, as she breathed smoke out like she was Marlene Dietrich.

"Hawkeye tastes better," she murmured.

Hawkeye wondered if it would be bad manners to carry his wife into the bedroom in the middle of a pot party.

"Well, that's a given."

Hawkeye hesitated and then leaned towards Trapper. He knew this was crazy but he also knew that Trapper wouldn't slap him, and Margaret wouldn't storm indignantly out of the room.

Both of Trapper's eyebrows went up but he didn't back away. His lips parted when Hawkeye reached them. Trapper tasted as good as he remembered. Hawkeye couldn't tell if Trap tasted of marijuana, since his own mouth was saturated in dope by now.

After the kiss, Trapper looked at him in amusement and affection, but not surprise. Had he planned this? No, Trapper's schemes were more straightforward. And why not get Hawkeye high back in Boston, one of the times that Margaret hadn't tagged along?

Hawkeye looked over at his wife. She was taking another puff, less cautiously now. He wondered what she'd thought of the kiss. Despite his condition, he visually examined her condition. No signs of jealousy, perhaps of arousal, although the wide eyes and flushed cheeks might be due to the marijuana.

"You both taste better than pot," he said. He didn't know if they needed his permission or blessing, but they had it. And he knew the circle or triangle needed to be completed. That is if they were both up for it, whether "it" was just kissing or something more. They could always blame it on marijuana later, if they needed an excuse.

He was still literally as well as figuratively between them, and that might've been why they hesitated. Or maybe there were other barriers besides Benjamin Franklin Pierce. He wondered if he should move aside.

But Trapper wasn't one to let a Gordian knot stop him. After a silent minute passed, he got up and sat on Margaret's other side. "Well?" he said again.

She nodded and then tilted up her pointed chin. Trapper grinned crookedly down at her and then licked his own lips and hers. It was awkward as hell, and sexier than any kissing scene Hawkeye could remember in the movies. Of course, the marijuana might've been intensifying sensations for Hawkeye rather than blunting them. He'd have to try to recreate this sometime when they were all sober, for comparison's sake.

As the kiss continued, he checked himself for signs of jealousy. But he'd seldom gotten jealous or possessive where his wife was concerned. Oh, he'd wanted to get her away from Frank, but mostly for the good of the camp and her own good. As for Trapper, Hawkeye had always felt secure about what they had. Maybe he took Trapper a little for granted sometimes, but he never doubted that Trapper was on his side, even as he sat on Margaret's other side and gave her a hell of a kiss. And got a hell of a kiss.

When it was over, Trapper said, "You were right, Hawk. Once you get her away from Frank, she's a major kisser."

Hawkeye couldn't help grinning, even though his wife was probably annoyed with him.


	11. Listing

Margaret waited for her husband's puns. Maybe something like "Generally, she's a major kisser" or a cruder pun about "kissing privates." But he seemed to be looking guilty as well as delighted, and it took her a moment to realize why.

Whenever the three of them were together, her husband seemed torn between "Ben" and "Hawkeye." That is, on the one hand Dr. Pierce was her husband, sometimes teasing her in a domestic way, pretending to be henpecked, although she probably nagged him ten times more when they were enemies who had kissed a couple times. On the other hand, Dr. Pierce was the rebel draftee who reverted to his early Captain Pierce behavior when he was around his old buddy Trapper. This situation was like usual when the Pierces visited Dr. McIntyre, or he them, but more complex.

Despite her brain being a bit addled by marijuana and kissing, she set the joint in the ashtray and made a mental list of what was going on:

1\. The three of them were breaking the law, although admittedly in a city that might enforce that law less strictly than other places.  
2\. While under the influence of marijuana, she, a married woman, had just kissed her husband's best friend, with her husband's blessing and encouragement.  
3\. That best friend was a man she'd long been attracted to and who, judging by the way he kissed back, still maintained whatever attraction he'd always felt for her.  
4\. Her husband and his best friend had been a team in the old days and they still "ganged up" on her sometimes, although in a much less hostile way than when she was "a major kisser" with Frank.  
5\. Her husband and his best friend had kissed and a hell of a lot more back in the old days, although she was pretty sure they hadn't kissed in America until that afternoon.  
6\. She didn't think this was a set-up by Hawkeye and/or Trapper, although if she wanted to be paranoid, she could ponder what role B.J. the prankster played in buying the wine. She did, however, think that this was something the three of them wanted and maybe they were just waiting for the right circumstances.  
7\. On the other hand, she wasn't sure how she felt about all this, or how the men felt about it. And maybe they were each wondering how the other two felt.  
8\. Even with wine and marijuana, they might feel too paralyzed by doubt and indecision and, yeah, guilt to proceed.  
9\. They were arguably more intoxicated the first night she got drunk and sang with them, and they didn't even touch each other then, but she was on better terms with both men these days of course.  
10\. This probably wasn't going to stop with kissing, at least she hoped not, although for a woman who had been monogamous since her divorce (and would've been monogamous during her first marriage if Donald hadn't cheated and Hawkeye hadn't been there for her when she needed him most), she knew even kissing another man was a big step.  
11\. It might've been a smaller step for Hawkeye, since he'd already had sex with both of them repeatedly, but it was still a step for the wild man who now lived comfortably as the small-town doctor he was always meant to be.  
12\. It was impossible for her to say how big a step this was for Trapper, who had never been monogamous even when he was. (That is, he probably had months or even years of not cheating, but he didn't think monogamously in the way that B.J. did.)  
13\. Someone was going to have to speak soon because this silence was incredibly awkward, but she had no idea how to voice any of what she was thinking.

Trapper again was the one to break the silence, this time getting up and going back to the chair across from the couch. He picked up his guitar and strummed, not any song she could identify, just random chords.

"So, uh, listen," Ben said. It was just four syllables, mostly meaningless, but whenever he said them, it took her back to the Summer of '53, when he and she didn't know how to say goodbye forever in words and so they said it with what was supposed to be their very last kiss, not realizing they'd kiss again before winter.

This wasn't a goodbye, for any of them. And it wasn't a hello, or even a hello again. It wasn't an end or a beginning, but rather a middle that was both inevitable and surprising. So she replied as she had thirteen summers ago, "Yeah, uh."

Trapper didn't speak, or sing, but he played a pop song that took her a moment to recognize. Larry was less of an adolescent than J.T., so she probably heard less pop music than Trapper did, certainly less than Erin Hunnicutt's parents did. But this was one she didn't know she knew until Hawkeye chuckled. It was "Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind?" She remembered Ben explaining the naughty meaning of the name of the band Lovin' Spoonful.

The song was from the point of a view of a young man with a wandering eye. It didn't actually apply here, in that no one was being asked to choose between anyone, but rather they all had to choose whether to be together in some triangular formation. But Margaret could see the humor in Trapper's song choice of course.

Trapper stopped playing and said, "The wine was enough of a housewarming gift, ya know?"

"Yeah, but we wanted to give you something without B.J.'s help," Hawkeye said.

"So you two planned this?"

"Of course not!" she exclaimed.

Both men laughed, and she again had that them vs. her feeling. She did not, however, wish she had Frank in her corner just then.

"And I didn't buy the pot for your use," Trapper said and then shrugged. "But we're a little drunk and a little stoned and a little turned on in other ways, so what are we gonna do about it?"

That was so like Trapper to cut through everything and just ask. Hawkeye would banter and circle in, while Margaret would be half in denial about what was happening until she'd spill her guts. As if to prove this, Hawkeye said, "What do you want to do about it?" just as Margaret said, "Is this something we have to do something about?"

All three of them laughed and then Trapper said, "You're asking me? The only one of the three of us who isn't married anymore?"

"As if that ever mattered to you," she couldn't help scoffing.

"Listen, Major, in your younger days you weren't exactly a poster child for fidelity."

She gasped at his nerve, although he wasn't wrong. She had fooled around with married men, especially Frank, and she had cheated on Frank. But she'd never felt like any of those men, or Donald either, had deserved fidelity. It was different with Ben of course, especially since he was miraculously faithful to her.

"None of us were," Hawkeye said. "But this isn't cheating, right?"

Trapper shrugged again. "A couple kisses in front of each other? No. But it's your marriage and I don't know what your rules are. I just don't want to cause trouble."

She almost said, "Well, that's a switch," but she realized he meant he didn't want to hurt Hawkeye. Whatever he thought of his best friend's marriage, he knew that she made Hawkeye happy and he wouldn't want to do anything to make Hawkeye unhappy. Most of the trouble he stirred up in the old days was as Hawkeye's sidekick and it was rare and minor when he did anything against Hawkeye.

Hawkeye said, "I appreciate that. We don't have any rules, at least not that I know of. Believe it or not, this situation hasn't come up before."

"Not even in a swingin' town like Crabapple Cove?"

Hawkeye smiled. "Surprisingly no."

"This is different," she said. "The three of us have a history together."

"Yeah, it's not like you picked me up in a bar."

She blushed, dimly remembering flirting with him at Rosie's.

"Look, Trap, the fact that you are divorced actually makes me more hesitant."

"You wish I was still with Louise?"

"Melanie," Margaret murmured, making Trapper smile at her.

"No, of course not. But I don't know, Trap, you're sort of vulnerable right now."

Trapper apparently found this hilarious, guffawing as he said, "Oh, yeah, I'm a delicate flower and you wouldn't want to take advantage of me."

Margaret giggled a little. It was funny when you put it that way.

Hawkeye shook his head. "Never mind."

"No, go on. I want to hear how fooling around with you two would scar me for life."

Hawkeye sighed and said, "It's just, well, you always had Louise."

"Melanie," Margaret and Trapper said together and then smiled at each other.

"No, she was Louise then. The little woman back home that you would go back to someday. So if a nurse shot you down, you'd shrug and move on. But you're alone now, right?"

"Well, I'm married to my career."

"Forget it."

"Look, Hawk, I get it. You two are going to go home to Maine, whatever happens this weekend. And I'm going to be on my own. But that's fine. I've never seen the fact that fun will end as a reason to not have fun. I just don't want to screw things up by screwing you two. If we screw of course."

"Can you please not call it 'screwing'?" Margaret said.

"I was trying not to say 'fuck.' "

Hawkeye laughed in his big way and she let out a laugh that was half gasp.

"Sorry. If I make sweet, sweet love to you two and you feel like there's something missing in your marriage, I don't want to be responsible for that."

She crossed her arms and said, "Oh, I see. You're such an incredible lover that you'll threaten our marriage."

"He is pretty good," Hawkeye said. "Not to the point that I'd divorce you."

"Thank you," both Margaret and Trapper said and then smiled at each other again. She uncrossed her arms.

Hawkeye looked back and forth between them before continuing. "Speaking just for myself, I think it'd be great to be in bed with both of you. And, well, to be honest, I've always wondered what it would be like."

Margaret wasn't particularly surprised and Trapper didn't seem to be either. It wasn't just that everyone thought of Captain Pierce as a degenerate, although that was a factor of course. It was also that Hawkeye loved both of them, in different ways, and it wouldn't be just sex to him. Maybe back in '50 or '51, since he didn't love her yet, but definitely not now. She actually was a little worried about him because of that, because she and Trapper didn't love each other, and they were both secure in their roles in his life. She didn't want to see Ben be hurt by this experiment.

Trapper shrugged. "I'll admit to being curious. Margaret?"

He spoke as if this were a parlor game and it was now her turn. She could feel herself blushing. She couldn't deny it but she couldn't easily admit it. "Well, obviously I like being in bed with Hawkeye."

Ben kissed her cheek and exclaimed, "Thanks, Honey!"

"And, um, you both know I'm attracted to Trapper."

"I think even Frank knows that," Hawkeye said.

"But, uh, together? The three of us? That's a big step."

"Hey, Sugar, you wanna leave this guy in the living room and step into my bedroom?"

"Oh, no, you don't! If I'm going to be cuckolded, it's going to be in front of my face."

"Whatever position you like, Hawk."

She blushed and giggled, while Hawkeye was momentarily stunned and then fell off the couch laughing.


	12. Signpost

Trapper grinned down at his best friend, who was literally rolling on the floor with laughter. He could still get to Hawkeye, in more ways than one. Then he looked over at Margaret, who was looking down at the joint in the ashtray. Trapper still had two joints prepped but they presumably had a whole weekend. This one had served its purpose, although he hadn't known that purpose when he rolled it.

It wasn't like this was the first time the three of them had been alone together, in America or Korea. Was his divorce all it had taken? Or was it just, as Transcendence Moonflower put it last week, that the stars had finally aligned?

"Are you going to get up or are you waiting for us to to join you?" he asked Hawkeye.

Hawkeye managed to sit up. "I'm guessing your bed is more comfortable."

Trapper shrugged. "Probably. I haven't tested either out. Not with other people I mean."

"Have you been with anyone since you moved out here?" Margaret could be both direct and indirect at the same time.

"I've been around other people. But, no, I haven't been to bed with anyone."

Hawkeye looked serious again. "Trap, are you sure—?"

"Hawk, yes, I am OK with you two being my first and second, or tied for first, since my divorce. It can be a belated celebration."

"Maybe we shouldn't rush into this," Margaret said.

"So you wanna leave necking for your next visit?"

She smiled a little. "No, I mean, let's not immediately have, have sex. Let's lead up to it."

"Don't worry, I love foreplay."

"Who doesn't?" Hawkeye said.

Trapper grinned down at him again and then stood up and helped him get to his feet. Then both men looked over at Margaret, who was still sitting on the couch.

Trapper had never been able to really read her, and it had apparently taken Hawkeye years to learn how, with her surprising him sometimes even now. On the surface, she had seemed simple at first. She loved Frank Burns and the Army, not necessarily in that order. But there would be moments that showed signs of the woman underneath. She intrigued Trapper but she didn't fascinate him like she fascinated Hawkeye, although Hawkeye denied that fascination for a very long time. Anyway, Trapper wasn't sure what she was thinking. She wanted this but she hesitated. Was he and/or Hawkeye supposed to seduce her into this?

Then he thought of all their attempts, mostly Hawkeye's but some his, not serious but persistent, to seduce her at the 4077th. That is, like Harpo patting the bed for Margaret Dumont to join him in whatever movie that was (Hawkeye would know of course), they never expected her to say yes, but they wouldn't have kicked her out of the bed if she'd said yes. And Margaret Houlihan was a hell of a lot sexier than Margaret Dumont.

There had been those moments when Major Houlihan had been more like Thelma Todd flirting with Groucho, drunken moments. And, although Trapper would never describe himself as chivalrous, he hadn't made his move on her then. Taking advantage of her drunk wouldn't be the same as taking advantage of any other drunk nurse. So nothing ever happened beyond flirtation, and even though they'd both said yes now, and Hawkeye said yes, Trapper wasn't sure how to get past the barrier of the past.

Margaret reached for the joint and took a puff. She had very sexy lips, her old nickname well-earned. She slowly breathed the smoke out. Then she stubbed the joint out in the ashtray, stood up, threw her arms around Trapper's neck, and pulled his head down for a kiss that he enthusiastically returned. OK, he'd let her run this, and not just since she outranked him.

When she let go, she looked over at her husband, maybe for approval or maybe not. Trapper looked over, too, and saw Hawkeye grinning. Then Hawkeye reached out for her and scooped her up into his arms. She giggled. Trapper liked her giggle and wondered how much of it was due to pot. Maybe the pot was just bringing out her girlishness, along with whatever other hidden qualities he was going to discover that weekend. Yes, he was defiitely intrigued.

"Bellhop, please show us to the honeymoon suite," Hawkeye said. "Make it snappy and there'll be a big tip for you."

"Oh, I expect more than the tip."

Margaret giggled and Hawkeye looked like he was trying not to laugh hard and drop his wife. Trapper would've caught her though.

Trapper said, "This way, Sir," and led them the few yards to his bedroom. He opened the door with a flourish and stepped aside.

Hawkeye looked around and said, "Quaint but charming."

"Hospital corners," Margaret said, looking down at the bed. "I'm impressed."

Trapper almost said, "I hoped you would be," but instead said, "We aim to please at McIntyre Arms."

Hawkeye passed Margaret into Trapper's arms and Trapper waited for the obvious verbal pun but instead Hawkeye walked over to the wall by the headboard of the bed. "You got 'Boston'!"

"What?" Margaret said, looking around.

Trapper turned her to face that wall. "I got the Boston sign from Chucklehead."

She giggled. "How did you manage that?"

"My poker expertise."

Hawkeye laughed. "You're a terrible poker player! You were my second income at the 4077th."

"I'm a better player than Winchester."

Hawkeye shook his head. "No, you're not."

"OK, maybe he lost out of pity because of my divorce. The point is, he said," Trapper slipped into the Brahmin accent he'd grown up hating and envying, " 'I don't really need a tatty reminder of being marooned in the Swamp. You can take it as a reminder of the home you're fleeing, dear old Beantown.' "

Both Pierces laughed. They were so easy to amuse in this condition. Well, Hawkeye had always been easy to amuse, especially for Trapper. But in the old days, Trapper never saw Margaret laugh when she was sober. He found out years later that on her first morning after with Hawkeye, she confessed that she used to smile behind her mask at Hawkeye's wisecracks in the OR. And she did laugh sober after Trapper's time, in Korea and America, but usually not because of Trapper.

"Are you going to try to win 'San Francisco' off B.J.? " she now asked.

He smiled down at her. "Nah, one sign per person seems fair." Well, Winchester didn't have a sign anymore, but he'd had "Boston" for a dozen years.

She pouted. "I didn't get a sign. I didn't have a home to go back to."

"That's because you're an Army brat, Major," her husband said.

"Or maybe you just had the soul of a Gypsy," Trapper teased.

She giggled and he had to kiss her. She tilted her head up as he tilted his head down. She tasted very sweet, despite the pot.

But his arms were getting tired so he carefully set her down on the foot of the bed, not letting go of her.

Hawkeye was sitting at the head of the bed. He grinned and waved.

Trapper took one hand off Margaret and waved back. He wasn't sure how this was going to work in practice, splitting his attention like this. Or were they supposed to take turns being the center of attention? Three was an odd number, in more ways than one.

"Hey, can you get your shoes off my bedspread?"

"Any other clothing you'd like me to remove?"

Margaret leaned in like she was going to kiss Trapper's neck, but instead she whispered in his ear until he grinned again.


	13. Center

Hawkeye was enjoying watching his wife and his best friend flirt and kiss. He just wasn't sure how far to step back, since this was supposed to be about all three of them, but there was much more novelty to their side of the triangle. He wanted to be both an observer and a participant, but that probably wasn't possible.

When Trapper told him to get his shoes off the bed, Hawkeye automatically flirted. Trapper might've flirted back if Margaret hadn't whispered in his ear. Hawkeye was intrigued and maybe a little jealous, or at least left out.

Then they each reached out for one of his feet. He grinned again.

They slipped off his loafers and peeled off his socks. She tickled his right foot a little, but Trapper started massaging his left. He'd forgotten how great Trapper's hands were, strong but aware, surgeon's hands like Hawkeye's own.

Part of Hawkeye wanted to close his eyes in bliss and part of him wanted to look at both of them, his wife and his ex-lover. And part of him wanted to make foot puns, but he didn't want to spoil the mood.

Then Margaret started kissing his foot, which tickled a little, too. She didn't have a foot fetish and usually ignored his feet, not that he minded. She did have sensitive feet herself and liked it when he painted her toenails, a skill he developed with a few of the nurses at the 4077th. It was a great seduction technique, making the woman feel spoiled while touching her intimately but not too intimately. So one summer he decided to try it on his wife.

"Oooh!" she'd exclaimed the first time. "You're even better than Frank!"

He had to laugh. It was rare that she compared him to Frank or any of her other exes. She'd admitted a few times that Hawkeye was the best she ever had, but she'd usually add, "I know I shouldn't feed your ego."

He now saw her glance over his foot at Trapper. He wondered what she'd whispered to Trapper.

"Am I supposed to be the center of attention?" he guessed.

"Aren't you always?" Trapper cracked.

Margaret crawled up the bed and then lay next to him. She whispered in his ear, "I want you to be the focus at first. We're both familiar with you, although it's been awhile for Trapper."

He chuckled. "So you're going to ignore our host?" he whispered back.

"Not ignore, but you are going to get most of my attention right now."

"I can live with that." He wanted to watch her with Trapper, but the weekend was just getting started.

Trapper's hands were massaging more deeply now. Hawkeye let out a groan, then felt self-conscious. It was a mixed blessing being the only one pleasured, and this was just his foot. Well, and his neck when Margaret started nuzzling that.

She started to undo the buttons on his shirt. She didn't usually undress him and he wondered if this was because they had an audience. Or maybe it was due to the marijuana and wine. She was a little like she was when she got tipsy, but not quite.

He wasn't sure if his own behavior was any different. He seemed to be grinning more than usual, but that was probably more to do with kissing and more with both of them. Trapper seemed much the same as usual, but then there'd never been much difference between Trapper sober and not.

She kissed Hawkeye's chest as she exposed it. She teased his nipples with her tongue. He again felt self-conscious, with her doing that in front of Trapper, but he certainly wasn't going to ask her to stop.

Then Trapper let go of Hawkeye's foot. He crawled up the bed and lay on Hawkeye's other side. He brushed Hawkeye's hair out of his eyes and then lightly kissed him.

Hawkeye put one hand into Trapper's curls and kissed him less lightly. It was different than kissing Trapper in the living room, especially with Margaret still kissing and unbuttoning his torso.

Then he felt her undoing his belt. He'd already been a little hard from the various stimuli, but he stiffened completely now.

"I thought you didn't want to rush into sex, Margaret," Trapper teased.

"I think she just meant with you," Hawkeye said, not sure if he was teasing.

"Maybe it's just foreplay," Margaret definitely teased as she undid the button on his slacks.

"What do you want me to do to you, Hawk?" Trapper whispered. "While she's busy down there?"

At first, Hawkeye thought it depended on what Margaret was up to. Then he decided it didn't really matter at this point. He wanted what he'd want from Trapper even if they were alone.

So he started necking with him. He'd half forgotten how good Trapper was at this. Well, he remembered that Trapper was good at it, but not the details. Trapper managed to be both teasing and casual, doing things like trailing kisses along the sensitive parts of the neck and blowing softy in the ear.

Hawkeye wanted Margaret to experience this. He looked down at his wife and saw she was watching them, looking far more aroused than jealous. And then Trapper slipped his hand under Hawkeye's bottom and he and Margaret started to lower Hawkeye's slacks. OK, Hawkeye could stand being the center of attention awhile longer.


	14. Peep Show

Margaret wanted to keep watching the two men, but she reminded herself that this wasn't her own private peep show. After Trapper helped her get Hawkeye's slacks off, she grazed her hand lightly on the front of his boxers, the way he liked to be teased. He was very hard but she wasn't sure what she wanted to do with his erection, especially when she should probably share it with Trapper. Or was Trapper going to mostly watch, maybe necking with Hawkeye a little?

Then Trapper started to pull down the back of Hawkeye's shorts, so she tugged down the front. Hawkeye groaned and then grinned as he sprung free.

Trapper still had his hand near Hawkeye's bottom, and he moved it back to apparently pinch it.

"Trap!" Hawkeye gasped.

Margaret caught his penis as it thrust into the air. She started stroking it with one hand.

"Mmmm Margaret!"

"You want me to hold that while you get his pants all the way off?" Trapper offered.

"Yes, thank you."

He left that one hand on Hawkeye's bottom, while the other came over and stroked hers. Then she handed off her husband's penis.

She tugged his slacks and then boxers all the way off. She hesitated and then dumped them on the floor.

"Funny, I had you pegged as a neat freak," Trapper said.

"She is," Hawkeye said. "She'll pick those up and fold them before we're done."

He thought he knew her so well. Obviously he did in some ways, but she could still surprise him. She wasn't sure if what she was about to do would surprise him, but it would certainly please him.

She returned to his crotch and gently kissed Trapper's hand. Both men sighed happily. Then she kissed beyond his hand to the tip of Hawkeye's penis.

She looked towards the head of the bed and saw Trapper watching her, more intently than he'd ever watched her. Hawkeye on the other hand was kissing Trapper's neck.

Trapper tried to hold Hawkeye steady for her, although his hand was shaking a little. She could've again held Hawkeye's penis herself, but she liked the idea of Trapper helping her. She kissed and licked the tip and then along the side that Trapper didn't completely cover. Then Trapper's hand started moving up and down the shaft.

Her mouth followed the movements, kissing and licking as parts of the penis were exposed. It was a sort of game, with Hawkeye's penis as the toy.

Hawkeye was moaning but laughing at the same time. She wasn't sure if that was at all due to marijuana. She thought she was sober now, although she couldn't really tell.

She did feel more aware than usual of the taste of Ben's skin, something she usually took for granted. She couldn't help wondering what Trapper tasted like.

He caressed her cheek with his other hand. She wondered if he was hoping she'd give him oral sex, too. She'd like to, but not yet.

She took the head of Hawkeye's penis into her mouth and started sucking. Both men groaned and then she could hear them kissing. She wanted to watch but she needed to focus on pleasuring her husband.

Now Trapper shifted his hand closer to the base to give her some of the shaft to suck. She could really feel Ben pulsing against her lips and tongue.

And then he started thrusting in and out of her mouth, joining in the game. Trapper's grip was firm but flexible, accommodating their movements and still throwing in some of his own.

"God, do you come in her mouth?" she heard Trapper gasp.

"Yeah, sometimes," Hawkeye panted.

"Baby, I wanna see it!" Trapper begged.

She wasn't sure if he was talking to Hawkeye or her, especially since he was stroking her hair. But she definitely wanted him to see this.

And she wanted the taste of Hawkeye's satisfaction on her tongue again. It had been a couple weeks since the last time. And though things never got stale between them, they did get familiar. There was no denying that this weekend with Trapper was spicing things up.

"Yes!" Hawkeye cried when he came.

And she could taste his semen, as bittersweet to her as his sense of humor. She swallowed it, as she almost always did with him. With the generals, she usually spat it out discreetly if she could. Frank actually preferred her to spit it out and then brush her teeth before she kissed him again, because he thought it would be unmanly to taste semen, even his own. They used to call it "polish and spit."

Trapper tenderly stroked her hair and said, "Come up here and kiss me, Honey."

She smiled and crawled up along Trapper's other side. She looked at Ben to see if he minded, but he smiled at her. So she lay next to Trapper and French-kissed him.

He eagerly sucked her tongue and she didn't think it was just for a taste of Hawkeye. After all, he could've got that from the source if he wanted, not just secondhand.

"So Trapper's the center now," Hawkeye observed. "Unless you want to be, Margaret."

"No, it's Trapper's turn," she decided.


	15. Contented

Trapper loved watching her go down on Hawkeye. Yes, he hoped she'd do the same for him, but he also enjoyed seeing how happy she made Hawkeye. And it brought back fond memories of going down on Hawkeye himself. Tasting Hawkeye on Hot Lip's lips and tongue was perfect.

And yet, when the Pierces agreed that it was his turn to be at the center, he didn't feel the need to rush right into getting a hummer from her, or from Hawkeye for that matter. He'd meant it when he said he loved foreplay, giving and receiving.

He rolled over to kiss Hawkeye. He felt Margaret playing with his hair. She'd always liked the curliness.

After awhile, he felt Hawkeye pushing up his shirt, stroking his stomach. Then Margaret nibbled on his neck. He wondered if Hawkeye had told her he liked that or if she'd eavesdropped on her nurses back in the day. Or maybe it was just something she liked to do anyway.

Hawkeye's hands felt good on him. For fifteen years, they'd only touched to hug, to shake hands, to maybe pat an arm or back. He'd wanted to give Hawkeye a handjob, but he didn't mind it getting mixed in with Margaret's blowjob.

Hawkeye's other hand reached past Trapper for Margaret's face. From the sounds, he pictured Hawkeye stroking her face, her kissing Hawkeye's hand.

This was such a strange balancing act. Even with one person in the middle, the other two couldn't ignore each other, and no one wanted that anyway. Trapper thought of suggesting they drop the idea of focusing on one person at a time, but he wanted the Pierces to spoil him a little. And he wanted to help Hawkeye spoil her, but not just yet.

"Ben, can you peel off his undershirt?"

Trapper grinned. She used to lust after his shoulders, and he suspected his chest, although probably not as much as he lusted after her chest. (Her shoulders were nice, too, but mostly he liked how they looked when she stood at attention and stuck out her chest.)

"Uh huh," Hawkeye said, presumably taking Trapper's grin for permission.

Trapper shifted to help Hawkeye strip off the undershirt. Hawkeye was still wearing his unbuttoned shirt but nothing else. Margaret hadn't taken off anything except her shoes, but Trapper had waited this long to see her naked. He could wait awhile longer.

Hawkeye tossed Trapper's undershirt onto the growing pile on the floor. Then Margaret embraced Trapper from behind, resting her head on his shoulder. He stroked her hand against his stomach.

Then he rolled over and kissed her, this time cupping her face in both hands. Hawkeye stroked his hair and his spine.

Margaret stroked his chest, playing with the curls there. He nipped her neck and she let out a great shuddering breath. Then Hawkeye nibbled on his neck and Trapper sighed contentedly.

He liked being in the middle of the Pierces and liked it even more as he ended up necking with both, their bodies closer and closer to his. After awhile he lay on his back so he could see both of them, kiss both of them.

Now he just had turn his head as they took turns kissing his mouth. And sometimes they didn't take turns, kissing him together as all three of their mouths opened wide, three tongues and six lips dancing together.

They both stroked his face, his neck, his shoulders, his chest, his stomach.

Hawkeye breathed in his ear, "Trap, can I show it to her?"

He didn't have to ask what "it" was. "Go ahead, Hawk."

His best friend unfastened his belt, undid the button on his jeans, and pulled down the zipper.

"Ben!" Margaret gasped as if it were a surprise anniversary gift, which maybe in a sense it was.

Hawkeye took her hand and said, "Here." He led her to Trapper's crotch. "He's hard for us."

"Captain Obvious," Trapper muttered, making Hawkeye laugh and Margaret smile.

Then she shyly stroked him through his briefs, making Trapper bite his lower lip to keep from crying out her name.

"Ben, can you take him out?"

"Hey, Trap, you wanna go to the movies?"

Trapper snorted and Margaret rolled her eyes.

Then Trapper whispered in her ear, "He's been wanting to meet you for awhile." He liked that they were calling his cock "him" instead of "it."

"Well, I've seen him," she said both shyly and teasingly.

He knew she meant when he got drunk and ran naked through the mess tent, which she probably remembered better than he did. It was strange to think Hawkeye hadn't been there, but Hawk had R & R and they never got a chance to really say goodbye.

Not that Trapper liked long goodbyes, or anything mushy. But a kiss goodbye would've been a nice ending to carry to his life back home.

He turned his head and sort of gave Hawkeye that kiss now. Even though it wasn't a goodbye, it had the intensity of one. Yet it was a kiss of middle age rather than of youth, with regret and contentment mixed in. Hawkeye matched his wistful passion, his lips sometimes in the corners of Trapper's mouth, one hand tugging on Trapper's curls.

Margaret moaned quietly and stuck her hand into Trapper's briefs. Trapper was amused and flattered. He moved so that she could strip him from the waist down.

But it was Hawkeye who finished undressing him.


	16. Guided Tour

Hawkeye smiled down at his naked friend. "You're really built, you know, you son of a gun."

Both Trapper and Margaret looked a little embarrassed, although he was sure he remembered that time in the shower more vividly than either of them, especially her. He especially remembered thinking she was flirting with him and then it turned out she had a yen for Trapper. He'd thought at the time that he couldn't blame her. When she spoke of how Trapper had been out of uniform, etc., Hawkeye said, "That's when I fell in love with him." Even if she'd been sober, she wouldn't have guessed that he hadn't been entirely kidding. From the look on Trapper's face, he knew, although it'd be weeks before he brought it up.

They'd all been dressed that night in the shower. Well, Hawkeye had been standing just outside the stall, while Trapper was inside with Hot Lips. Trapper got some of the runoff when he drenched her, while Hawkeye watched from a safe distance. If she got wet tonight, well.

He wondered how aroused she was. It was hard to tell with all her clothes on, although he thought her nipples might be hard.

There was no such doubt with Trapper. His nipples were hard and so of course was his penis. And the look in his eyes was one that Hawkeye used to know well.

Hawkeye was at the foot of the bed, sitting cross-legged. "Can I continue giving her the tour of McIntyria?"

"You make me sound like a disease."

"You are incurable." He didn't say incurable romantic. Trapper wasn't that.

"I've visited the northern half," Margaret said.

"Come over here and see the foothills."

She kissed Trapper's cheek and then went to kneel beside Hawkeye.

"These are his feet. As you can see, they're large, but not as large as B.J.'s."

"Does that mean something?" Trap teased.

Hawkeye had seen B.J.'s penis of course. Thanks to surgery and showers, he'd seen many of the penises that passed through the 4077th. He hadn't taken a personal interest in most of them. And Trapper's was the only one he'd ever seen erect.

"Trapper wears smaller shoes?" Margaret pretended to guess.

Hawkeye chuckled. "Uh, right." Well, it was true.

"Tell me about Trapper's legs."

"Well, they're long but sturdy, hairy. You'll have seen them when he plays catch in shorts."

She blushed a little but also stroked the calf on her side, cautiously, like he might kick. Trapper of course grinned.

Hawkeye began stroking Trapper's other leg. "Continuing our journey north, we reach the knees. Do you want me to use the Latin terms?"

"No thank you."

He supposed a real tour guide would use accessible terms. Of course, Margaret was a nurse and a grown woman who had seem almost as many naked men as he had. But he liked playing this game, and Trapper didn't seem to mind.

"We move on to the thigh region."

"Mm," she said, just a quick sound but enough to make Trapper groan quietly.

Both Pierces moved their hands along Trapper's thighs, the dark blond hair getting thinner beneath their fingertips and palms. And Hawkeye could feel Trapper's leg muscles tensing with anticipation.

"His upper thighs are sensitive, not as much as yours of course."

"God!" both Trapper and Margaret gasped.

Hawkeye felt a wave of lust for both of them, but a wave that was as much a desire to see them make love as it was to make love to them. He reminded himself to be patient. Good things come to those who wait.

Trapper also looked like he was struggling for patience. He was biting his lower lip and his empty hands were clenching. He'd been waiting longer, and in some ways he was a less patient man than the other doctor.

As for Margaret, she was patient with patients and anyone she had to take care of, like Larry. If it was something that couldn't be hurried, she had all the time in the world. However, her military side could be demanding when it wanted results.

Sex, lovemaking, was different of course. It had its own ever-changing rhythms, and no goals as such. Orgasms and fun and sometimes an expression of love, but the details were different every time.

Sometimes she was demanding before and during sex, but never in a way that Hawkeye resented. He was rarely impotent with her, which was saying something, considering his age and how long they'd been married. If he couldn't get it up, it would be because he was stressed or tired from work, and that was a lot less common in Maine than in Korea. Anyway, she was demanding in a sexy way, telling him what she wanted him to do to her, what she was going to do to him.

Other times she was sweet and melty, and that was when he teased her, until he'd turn sweet and melty, too.

Making love with Trapper was its own set of games, as this day was bringing back to him. Playful in a different way than with Margaret, and somehow both relaxed and competitive.

Besides the hope of doubling his lust, the reason Hawkeye wanted to be in bed with both of them was to see what the blend of styles and games would be. Of course, it might go horribly wrong, but he had definitely enjoyed it when he was the one being spoiled, and he hoped Trapper was enjoying this.

"And now we reach the groin region. As you can see, Trapper is a natural blond."

As he expected, she blushed and Trapper chuckled. Even their gasps when he let his fingertips graze Trapper's penis were predictable, but delightful nonetheless.

He was startled when Margaret cupped Trapper's balls without an invitation from him or Trapper.

Trapper grinned lazily and said, "That feels good, Honey."

Hawkeye gripped Trapper's penis.

"So does that, Sugar."

Trapper rarely used endearments with him, although he used to toss them around like candy to the 4077th nurses. Hawkeye would've suspected him of sarcasm but he knew Trapper meant it. His penis couldn't lie.

Hawkeye took his wife's other hand. "I'm taking you to, um, Pole-Land."

Trapper groaned, but at the pun.

"What?" Margaret said.

"My pole," Trapper said, wiggling it a little.

"Oh." She blushed again. But she squeezed Hawkeye's hand and let him move hers onto Trapper's penis.

Trapper squeezed his eyes shut and whispered, "Fuck," like this was suddenly too much.

"Not quite yet," Hawkeye said.

Margaret giggled nervously. And then she kissed Hawkeye. They kissed for awhile, as their hands played with Trapper.

Then she let go and backed away, but only to rest her head on Trapper's still well-defined stomach. Hawkeye lay down and put his head next to hers. He gazed into her big blue eyes, trying to read them.

She kissed his mouth quickly and then glanced down. He nodded and kissed his way a few inches down. She unhesitatingly followed.


	17. Voyeur

The Pierces were going down on him. Hawkeye and Hot Lips were kissing and licking his cock together. Sometimes they'd pass it back and forth like a joint and other times they'd concentrate on different parts, like one at the head and the other at the base, until they'd meet on the staff and smooch each other.

Trapper loved this. He fucking loved this. He'd been with two girls a few times, but he didn't have a history with any of them. Not like this. So it wasn't just that this time it was a girl and a guy instead of two girls. It was that it was Hawkeye and Hot Lips, or Ben and Margaret as he could hear them quietly calling each other when their mouths weren't full of him.

He was the center of their attention, but it was almost like this was an expression of their love for each other. To be honest, he felt a little like a voyeur, spying on a married couple's intimacy, even if they were being intimate about his schlong. Not that he had anything against voyeurism of course.

On the most basic level, it felt good to have two people who were good at it giving him a blowjob. Hawkeye was rusty of course, but Trapper understood. It wasn't like he'd been fellating himself. Well, if he could fellate himself, he'd probably never leave the apartment.

He chuckled, which made both Pierces look up at him. "Nothing," he murmured. He'd tell Hawkeye later, if he got the chance.

Margaret went back to licking the tip of his cock but soon shifted into sucking.

"Damn, you're good, Darlin'!" Trapper stroked her hair, imagining it as long as it used to be, although admittedly it would've gotten in the way more than it did in a flip.

Hawkeye looked up at him and asked, "What about me?"

"You are one lucky bastard."

Hawkeye grinned as if he couldn't deny it. Then he kissed his wife's blushing, hollowed cheek and returned to licking Trapper's shaft.

Margaret's hot mouth took in more of Trapper, her hot tongue massaging him, and he had to start thrusting, even if poor Hawk got pushed towards the base, not that he seemed to mind. The three of them worked out a rhythm, different than when she was going down on Hawkeye while Trapper was giving a handjob. Trapper thought about what it'd be like when he and Hawk teamed up on Hot Lips.

Trapper started to come and it was so good! Finally, finally, not just that evening, but after sixteen years, although back then he'd never have been able to imagine it like this.

He wondered if she'd swallow his cum, but he'd understand if she didn't. This was different than her going down on her husband.

Hawkeye had stopped licking towards the end and just watched his best friend come in his best girl's mouth. He now tenderly stroked her hair and said, "I love you."

She kissed him, an open-mouthed kiss that poured Trapper's cum into Hawkeye's mouth. Trapper found himself imagining how revolted Frank Burns would've been at this gorgeous sight.

"Mmmm, I've missed that," Hawkeye said after he swallowed.

"Well, we're staying all weekend. I think Trapper John will give you another taste if you ask nicely."

He chuckled, partly at her use of "Trapper John," his more formal nickname.

Hawkeye made his way up Trapper's body, alternating kisses with words. "Will. You. Do. Me. The. Great. Honor. Of. Ejaculating. In. My. Mouth. In. The. Next. Couple. Days. Captain. John. Francis. Xavier. McIntyre?"

Trapper couldn't resist. "Come again?"

It was corny, but Hawkeye laughed like Trapper had said something very witty. Was he still high? Or maybe he was still a little giddy from his own orgasm.

Margaret shook her head but she was smiling. Trapper thought of how she'd chosen to go last. Was she being selfless or was it that women take longer to warm up? Or maybe she just wanted to save the best for last.

Hawkeye returned to kissing his way up and then started necking with Trapper again. Trapper necked back but he was distracted thinking about how exactly they might spoil Margaret. With men, coming was a one-time thing, at least until they rested up. And he and Hawk weren't twenty anymore, or thirty.

But if they gave her manual and/or oral sex, she could keep going no matter how many times she came. So maybe she'd want vaginal sex tonight, with one or both of them, even if she wouldn't be the only one getting attention.

And that brought up an important question. He wasn't sure how to lead up to it, and maybe if he'd been sober he'd think this through more. But he stopped necking with her husband and asked, "So, Margaret, how old are you?"

Hawkeye put his hand over his eyes, while Margaret, her head still near Trapper's crotch, narrowed her eyes at him. Trapper wondered if he should instead have offered her another joint, but it was too late now.


	18. Pathé

Margaret sat up and crossed her arms. "Why the hell would you ask me that?" And why now, after she'd brought him to orgasm? Well, with Ben's help. She'd felt connected to him. Why did he have to spoil it?

"Sorry, let me rephrase that. Have you gone through menopause?"

She could feel herself about to go into a full-on Major Margaret Houlihan rant, which she seldom indulged in these days and which McIntyre hadn't heard in fifteen years. But Ben uncovered his face and said, "She's on the Pill."

Margaret laughed in surprise. "Trapper, are you afraid of getting me pregnant?"

"Don't worry, Trap, I wouldn't make you marry her if you did."

"Well, then you're more understanding than Louise's father."

Margaret stared at Trapper and even Ben looked surprised.

"Trap, you had to get married?"

Trapper shook his head. "I guess you never did the math."

Margaret did it now. Trapper was 46 and Becky, his firstborn, was 22. It wasn't like he got married straight out of high school, but he had been young.

"It was 1943," Trapper said getting out of bed and her eyes followed him, not just because he was naked. He waved his hand towards Hawkeye like Ed Sullivan and said, "Pathé."

For a moment she thought he might be saying "pathos" in French, but Hawkeye cleared his throat and went into a pitch-perfect rendition of a newsreel narrator. "It's 1943 and the world is again at war. Meanwhile, on the homefront, in Boston, cradle of the American Revolution, a young medical student battles his own libido."

Trapper chuckled as he reached into a front pocket of his jeans and took out another marijuana cigarette. "Thanks for setting the scene, although there was more to it than that." He looked for and found another lighter. "Sorry, but I can't tell this sober and I think the other joint is wearing off."

"It's fine," she said softly. She was touched that he was going to share something so personal that he'd never mentioned it to even Hawkeye all this time.

Trapper lit the joint, took a puff, and breathed it out. "So it was 1943. Yeah, I was a horny young med student. And Louise wasn't the only girl I was seeing. There was, for instance, Mildred Feeney in Chicago."

"The ribs girl!" Hawkeye cried in delight.

"Was she skinny?"

"Never mind," both men said.

Then Trapper sat at the foot of the bed, while Margaret stayed in the middle, Hawkeye at the head. Trapper took another puff and then released it. "Louise was my best girl. The kind you'd marry but also the kind that fooled around, just with me."

"I don't think I'd marry the kind of girl who just fooled around with you."

"I meant generic 'you,' Hawk. Anyway, the world was at war. Louise didn't want to see me get killed. Hell, I didn't want to see me get killed. So when she got pregnant, her dad didn't have too hard a time convincing me to do the right thing. Besides, I was a good Catholic boy."

She laughed but not as much as Hawkeye.

"I was! Well, in some ways. And it wasn't until she told me, sometime between Kathy and Korea, that I knew she got pregnant on purpose."

"She trapped you, Trap?" Hawkeye wasn't laughing anymore.

Trapper shrugged and took another puff. "Yeah, but maybe she saved my life, even though Uncle Sam caught me for the next war. And I got great kids, so I can't complain."

"But your marriage was built on a lie!" Margaret exclaimed.

He shrugged again. "It happens. And it was a lie in a good cause. Besides, I don't know that she was getting any prize with me."

"Because you cheated? Or did you cheat because you were trapped?"

He sighed. "I cheated because I'm not meant to be monogamous. And lots of guys cheated during the war. We just weren't all hypocrites like your boyfriend Frank."

She was not going to defend Frank Burns. She'd at first seen the need for him to pretend they were just friends and she'd certainly played along. She'd had her own need to pretend, although of course they'd never done a very good job of fooling anyone. But she'd always hoped it was temporary, that he'd divorce his Louise and marry her, until she gave up on that dream and felt he'd done her a favor by not following through. Trapper at least never made any promises for the future. All those nurses knew exactly what they were getting with him, no more, no less.

"Did you love her?"

Hawkeye's question startled them both, although he did have the ability to ask very personal questions in a very direct way when he wanted to.

Trapper turned so he could see Hawkeye. "I guess, but not capital-L love. I've probably never been in love with anyone but you."

"And Captain Tuttle."

Trapper chuckled and passed the joint to his friend. "Of course."

To this day, she still wasn't sure what had happened with Captain Tuttle, other than it was possibly the most elaborate hoax Hawkeye had ever perpetuated against the Army, all to enrich the local orphanage. She'd become infatuated with the nonexistent captain, on his reputation alone. When Hawkeye told her about it later, it was still hard to sort out facts from lies and it was in some ways a taller tale than it'd been at the time. But the mention of Tuttle couldn't distract her from Trapper's last confession.

"Never?" she said softly.

Trapper looked at her. "Probably not. It's not a big deal. I've had a good life, had some fun, healed a bunch of people, and like I said, had great kids."

"But you spent over twenty years with Louise! I mean Melanie."

"She was Louise then. She's Melanie now. She doesn't regret the years of being my wife Louise, but she wants to try something different."

"I understand that." She'd reinvented herself in Korea, with her divorce part of that process, but then she hadn't spent decades with Donald, just months, and most of them not even in the same part of Korea. 

"But Ben, Hawkeye, was the love of your love!"

Both men laughed.

"I'm not trying to be funny!" She realized she sounded a little shrill, but she couldn't help it.

"Look, Sweetheart, I don't have to tell you about the great guy you married. But I never wanted to spend my life with him. And I still wouldn't be monogamous. And I wouldn't have had J.T. if I hadn't got to go home to Louise. I just want to be one of Hawkeye's best friends. And, OK, this weekend has been fun so far. But I'm not expecting it to turn into a regular thing."

She felt like crying, even though Trapper didn't want or need her pity. "Can I have the joint please?"

Trapper chuckled and Ben gestured for her to come and sit by him. She crawled to the head of the bed, Trapper stroking her back as she went by. She sat next to her husband, curling her legs under her. He held the joint out to her. She nodded her thanks, took the joint, and slowly inhaled and exhaled.

"Better?" Hawkeye said in his best bedside manner.

"Yes, but we're going to leave San Francisco terrible potheads."

"Hey," Trapper said, "I've been smoking pot for months and it's not at all addictive."

She gave him a reluctant laugh.

"So, Trap, you wanna help me show Hot Lips a good time?"

"Yeah, why not? There are no casualties expected for the next 48 hours. And my gorilla suit is at the cleaners, so poker is out."

"We could do strip poker."

"I think we're at a disadvantage at the moment, being naked and all."

"Oh, I don't know, you are the man who won the 'Boston' sign off that notorious card shark Charles Emerson Winchester III."

She thought of telling them to shut up and kiss her but, even if they were going to now spoil her, she wasn't going to let them restart the kissing. So she kissed her husband, a deep kiss that was long enough for Trapper to take the joint out of her hand, presumably extinguish the joint in the ashtray, come back to bed, and start kissing her hand and up her arm. She knew what she was getting with Trapper, no more, no less, and she was fine with that, if he was.


	19. Blue

In a way, Hawkeye wanted to give more thought to what Trapper had told them. But he knew that time was precious and Margaret had waited long enough for her turn.

When she turned to kiss Trapper, Hawkeye moved her hair out of the way to kiss the back of her neck, then he unzipped the back of her dress. He caressed her exposed upper back. He tugged the zipper a little lower and unhooked her bra.

She paused in kissing Trapper to murmur, "Ben."

He caressed her right side, inside her dress. He moved his right hand up to the side of her breast, still soft and smooth. She shivered, in a good way.

Then she squirmed, apparently less in frustration than in eagerness to get both arms out of her dress. Both men helped her lower the top half of the dress and remove her bra.

Then Trapper gazed at her breasts, "Mmm, very nice."

Hawkeye felt oddly proud, although he couldn't take any credit for his wife's breasts, other than they were a little larger than they used to be because he'd gotten her pregnant a dozen summers ago.

"Thank you," she said and lay on her back.

The two men again settled on either side of her. They took turns kissing her mouth as each of them claimed the breast nearest him. Hawkeye enjoyed fondling the right breast as much as he always did, but he perhaps enjoyed watching Trapper fondle the left breast even more.

Margaret seemed to be enjoying the double attention. Her kisses were eager and she was stroking both their hair.

"Honey." Hawkeye paused, thinking of how he used endearments differently with her than Trapper did. He continued, "Would you like us to suck your breasts?"

She again stopped kissing Trapper to speak. "Yes, please."

Trapper grinned. "Good."

She blushed as if Trapper had said, "Sugar, I would love to suck your tits." Hawkeye knew he was thinking it.

Hawkeye started kissing his way down to Margaret's exposed chest. Trapper gave her another French kiss and then followed.

Hawkeye knew her body better than anybody's but his own. She was new to Trapper, at least like this. Hawkeye liked thinking about that.

He wondered what she was thinking, but it wasn't like they had enough privacy for him to ask just then. He did know her nipples were very hard and her breath a little faster.

He thought of playing tour guide again, or joking about a consultation. But it felt like the time for that kind of play had passed. Besides, his mouth was going to be full for awhile.

He held her breast firmly as he kissed it. He glanced over at Trapper and saw his friend's touch was more tentative, as if still a little intimidated by her. Then Trapper's lips landed lightly on her left nipple.

She sighed wordlessly, and then breathed, "Trapper, Hawkeye."

He was a little startled to hear her use his nickname just then. He was so used to her calling him Ben, especially at intimate moments. But maybe she was thinking of who the three of them were to each other in Korea.

Trapper grinned up at her and whispered, "Hot Lips."

Hawkeye sucked her nipple.

"Ben!" she cried and tugged on his hair.

He stroked all around her right breast as he sucked the nipple. He could see Trapper next to him, teasing her nipple with his fingertips as he dropped light kisses all over her left breast.

Hawkeye and Trapper had made out with nurses in front of each other enough in the old days that Hawkeye was familiar with Trapper's technique. Well, he knew Trapper's technique with him, but Hawkeye didn't have perky breasts. Anyway, this wasn't Trapper's usual style. Was it that Trapper was stoned or was it that it was Margaret?

Trapper wandered over to the right breast and kissed Hawkeye's cheek. Hawkeye gave Margaret's nipple a peck and then turned his head to kiss Trapper.

Margaret apparently watched them kiss for awhile before she said, "I thought I was supposed to be the center of attention right now." He could tell from her tone that she was just teasing. She was enjoying watching them kiss as they rested their heads against her chest.

"Sorry, Darling, i didn't mean to neglect you," Hawkeye said, as he hiked up her skirt.

"Ben!" she gasped.

He squeezed her breast as he went back to sucking it, his other hand running up her thigh.

"Yes!" she cried.

Trapper kissed the other breast again, this time licking it. She giggled a little. Hawkeye had never heard her giggle as much as she had that evening. He didn't know if that was due to Trapper or the marijuana, or something else. Hawkeye liked it, but it did take some getting used to.

Hawkeye's hand reached her panties. He thought of singing in Korea, "They asked me how I knew her brassiere was blue." He knew every article of clothing his wife owned, especially the intimate items. He knew that she was wearing blue underpants today, in honor of the Pacific, although that was more of a sea green around here.

He caressed the center of her blue panties. It was wet, although not Pacific wet, not yet.

She moaned and arched her back. He squeezed her breast a little harder but teased it more with his mouth.

"She ready, Hawk?"

"She's ready for more foreplay."  


"That so, Honey?" Trapper asked up at her.

"Yes," she said breathlessly.

"Me up here and you down there, Hawk? And then switch off after awhile?"

"Yeah, sure." It felt weird to be discussing this, like surgery. But they'd once been a team, not for this of course. And, while they could've communicated nonverbally, it was good to be clear.

"That work for you, Darlin'?" Trapper asked up at Margaret, cupping both her breasts.

"Yes!" she gasped.

Hawkeye smiled and eased down his wife's blue panties.


	20. Opening

Margaret started moaning softly as Ben kissed down her belly and then skipped down to between her legs. She had a moment of feeling self-conscious about such intimacy in front of an outsider. She knew that was silly, considering what she'd done to Trapper and what he was now doing to her. But she couldn't help it. Trapper was certainly not a stranger and he was far more than an acquaintance, but he was more a friend of a friend than a friend.

She felt nervous and uncertain around him, but also intrigued and excited. And meanwhile, here was Ben, Hawkeye, who she knew so well, who knew her so well. Like, he knew that this was a time when she needed light, teasing touches and kisses. The situation was intense enough, getting spoiled by both men, he needed to hold back a little to give her a chance to adjust and anticipate.

Trapper meanwhile was massaging one breast while flicking the nipple of the other with his tongue. Then he murmured, "Soft but firm, you've got a great pair, Angel."

It was a line, probably one he'd said to a dozen women, but she still liked hearing it. "Thank you," she murmured back.

Then Ben focused on her clitoris and it was harder to form words. First he breathed on it, making her shiver. Then he kissed lightly until she arched her back, ready for more.

"So sexy!" Trapper growled as his head rose to follow her chest, one hand slipping under to help support her spine.

She bit her lower lip as Ben gave her clitoris licking kisses, his tongue swirling around it, and Trapper nuzzled both breasts from inside her cleavage.

After awhile, she cried, "More!"

So both men sucked her, Trapper her nipples, Ben her clitoris.

"God God God!"

Ben normally might've teased her about her "prayer," but he instead went back to kissing her outer lips, his hand now rubbing her clitoris. She could feel herself opening more for him, his mouth moving against her inner lips.

Trapper massaged both her breasts as he kissed his way up to her ear. "He's good, huh?" he whispered.

He knew of course how good a lover Hawkeye was. Well, many people knew that, by rumor or experience. But no one but she had been with him more often than Trapper had.

"That's why I married him," she whispered back.

He chuckled. "That's what I figured." He nibbled her neck. "So when do you want to have us switch off?"

"I thought that was up to you two."

"Well, I guess we'll wait for Hawkeye's tongue to get tired."

She moaned and rocked against Ben's face. Ben started using his hands more. Trapper snuggled against her, as if he wanted to share in her orgasm. So she was surrounded by his strength and warmth when she dripped her pleasure into Ben's hungry mouth.

Sometimes, in their own marital bed, Ben would keep going, seeing how many orgasms he could give her from cunnilingus. But this time he gave her one last kiss before grinning up at them. "Your turn to pleasure my missus, Trap."

"You got it, Hawk." Trapper gave her one more squeeze and then let go.

He kissed his way down as Ben kissed his way up. They kissed each other's mouth when they met.

"Mmm, tastes good," Trapper said afterwards.

"Why, thank you."

"I meant she tastes good."

"Right, but I have to take some credit for that."

She shook her head but smiled. Hawkeye would never entirely lose his conceit.

"Yeah, it's all you, Buddy." Trapper patted Hawkeye's naked bottom and then went back to kissing down Margaret.

Hawkeye chuckled and then continued his way up. He landed on her chest. He nuzzled both breasts before deciding which one to focus on.

Trapper murmured something that sounded like the word "blonde."

She was both a natural blonde and a bottle blonde. Her real hair color was a darker blonde than she liked, and the older she got, the lighter she wanted to go.

Ben had been teasing her for years about whether she was going to dye her pubic hair. Not that he wanted her to. "As long as you keep it neat and trim, I don't care if it's blue."

She had always kept it from getting too bushy. Although the military didn't have regulations on body hair— otherwise Klinger wouldn't have needed to try for a Section Eight— she thought of this as a legacy of her military discipline. Hawkeye just liked it because it made cunnilingus easier.

His enjoyment of oral sex, both giving and receiving, had not surprised her. He loved to kiss and he loved being a lover.

She'd wondered about Trapper occasionally. She knew the two men had performed fellatio on each other during their affair, and he'd probably gone down on a few of her nurses that year he was at the 4077th. But she didn't know how important oral sex was to him and, until that evening, whether he wanted to perform it on her.

Trapper's fingertips stroked the short dark blonde hair that Ben's saliva had slicked back. "What a delectable vulva!" he exclaimed in a posh British accent.

Hawkeye chuckled and reached down to play with Trapper's dark blonde curls, from roots to tips.

"Don't push me, Hawk!" Trapper mock-protested as if Hawkeye was pressing Trapper's face against her crotch.

She moaned at the thought of that, and her moan seemed to be reason enough for Trapper to dive under her skirt and start licking.


	21. Gruff

Trapper was going down on the former Major Margaret Houlihan. Somehow that felt even more incredible than that she'd gone down on him. She used to be so unapproachable and here she was, spread before him, crying his name, well, his nickname.

"Trapper, Trapper, Trap!" Like the Three Billy Goats Gruff crossing the bridge.

Meanwhile Hawkeye was kissing and caressing her lovely set of tits. So sometimes she'd breathe, "Ben, sweet Ben."

After awhile, one of Hawkeye's hands wandered under her and landed on that round but fit ass that used to drive Captain Pierce crazy in Korea. He squeezed it of course, but Margaret's "Ben!" sounded surprised this time.

She wiggled as Hawkeye kneaded her ass, and Trapper tried to keep up. At last she came on his face, in his face, her hot lips sharing her liquid joy, as her other lips had lapped up the ecstasy of his lap.

"Oh God, yes, yes!"

Trapper thought about continuing but his jaw was tired. He kept his hand between her legs and teased her cunt and her clit as he scooted back up the bed.

"Trap Trap Trapper!"

He waited until he could whisper in her ear, "Baby, I wanna fuck your delicious box!"

He thought that might shock her or it might further excite her, but apparently it amused her.

Hawkeye looked up at the sound of her giggle. "Are you telling her jokes?"

"It looks like it."

"Box!" Margaret exclaimed and giggled again.  


Now Hawkeye chuckled. "You couldn't say 'pussy' or 'cunt'?"

"Not to Maj— Margaret."

"But you could say 'fuck,' " she teased.

Trapper groaned, hearing her say that word.

Hawkeye grinned and then kissed his way up to Margaret's other ear. He didn't whisper, so Trapper knew he was meant to hear it. "Trapper wants to have vaginal intercourse with you now, huh?"

"Uh huh."

"And is that what you want?"

She rolled so that she could kiss Hawkeye. It was a soft, sweet kiss. Then she stroked his cheek and said, "You don't want to be first?"

He shrugged. "I got there back in '51. Or was it '52?"

Trapper expected her to give a wifely scolding or rant like Major Houlihan. Instead she said, "Maybe it is time for Trapper."

Trapper was as hard as if she'd said, "I want Trapper to fuck me all night long."

"Maybe?" he said, his hand teasing her between the legs again.

"She really wet, Trap?"

"Yeah. But I'm not going in until she says she wants it."

She cleared her throat, although her voice was husky as she said, "Trapper John, I want you to make love to me."

He couldn't help chuckling. His full nickname again, and that old-fashioned term for sex when she'd said "fuck" minutes ago.

Then he saw tears in her big blue eyes. So she could laugh at him but he couldn't laugh at her? That wasn't fair.

Hawkeye said, "It's tougher if you're an asshole about it, trust me."

"I'm not being an—" He stopped himself. He could argue, defend himself. Or he could make love to Margaret. "So, Sugar, you wanna be on top?"

She blushed. "Well, maybe to start."

"Then climb aboard, Honey." Trapper lay flat on his back.

Now Hawkeye chuckled. And Margaret sat up. She no longer looked like she was about to cry.

She finally took her dress all the way off. Even though Trapper had seen everything already, she was a magnificent sight completely naked. Even though they'd gone down on each other, it still seemed unreal that they were going to fuck.

And then she mounted him. One leg on either side of his hips, her sweet, hot cunt settling around his hard dick.

"Mmm, yeah! Feels good in there!" he moaned.

"Yes!" she gasped. It wasn't like she was a virgin, but it probably was weird yet exciting to have another man, another cock, after all this time.

"God, the two of you!" Hawkeye sounded so turned on, and they weren't even moving much yet, not technically fucking. And then she started rocking on Trapper, and Hawkeye groaned.

Trapper made a "gimme" gesture with one hand. Hawkeye knew, as he would've known in Korea, that that meant, "Gimme your cock. I'll take care of you, Hawk." There just hadn't been anyone else in the room before.

"God!" Hawkeye shifted so that Trapper could wrap one hand around Hawk's very flexible cock, while the other caressed Margaret's silky stomach.

"Oh, ooh!" Margaret really started rocking and thrusting.

Trapper moved his hand up to her chest. "Yes, ride me, Baby," he crooned. "Just like that." He squeezed one of her tits, while his other hand stroked up and down Hawkeye's shaft.

"Oh, Trapper! Kiss me, Ben!"

Hawkeye smiled and leaned to kiss her, cupping her pointed chin, stroking her blond bouffant. Trapper watched them kiss long and tenderly. His heart clenched but his dick flexed.

Margaret ground down onto him as his tool stroked her slick walls. And his hand pumped Hawkeye as his other hand teased Margaret's nipples.

Hawkeye came first, all over Trapper's hand. He carefully pulled away and lay next to Trapper. They French kissed and Trapper pretended he was sucking Hawkeye's dick and Hawk was sucking his. He hoped the weekend would include 69, or maybe even an oral triangle. He knew he was being greedy but he wanted to do as much as he could with them.

And then Margaret stopped fucking him.


	22. Beginning and End

Hawkeye hadn't wanted to come so soon. He wanted to watch awhile longer, a long while longer. Hell, he wanted to be inside his wife after Trapper came. He had to remind himself the weekend was just getting started.

Then he lay next to Trapper so he could watch Margaret's ride. But Trapper French kissed him, so he couldn't watch anymore, not that he minded. He could still see them coupling with his mind's eye.

Then suddenly she climbed off of Trapper and put her head on Hawkeye's crotch. Hawkeye felt the weight distribution on the bed change and then her hair was brushing against his pubes.

He couldn't help ending the kiss to watch her lick up his semen. "Sorry, Trap."

"Don't worry about it." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Trapper lick his own fingers. And then he felt and tasted Trapper sliding his fingertips against his, Hawkeye's, lips. Trapper kissed Hawkeye's neck and whispered, "Is it okay if I get back to her?"

"Knock yourself out."

Trapper chuckled. "Thanks."

Hawkeye supposed it was a funny reply, but it wasn't easy being a consensual cuckold. Again, not that he minded.

Trapper kissed Hawkeye's cheek and then scooted to where he could whisper in Margaret's ear. "...would you like that?"

"Yes!" she cried.

Hawkeye wanted to know what Trapper had just suggested, but he was happy to be surprised.

Margaret moved so that her legs were hanging off the bed, while her torso and head lay flat. Trapper got off the bed and stood behind her. One of his hands, sticky with more than one person's spit and cum, slid under her, teasing her tantalizingly from the sounds she was making. Hawkeye groaned in empathy.

Trapper's other hand made a _Get over here_ gesture. Hawkeye was tempted to say, "I can see better from where I am." But it was better to be a participant instead of the audience. True, it would probably be a long while until he could summon up another erection, no matter how turned on he was mentally, but he could still have fun and add to their pleasure.

He lay down where he could kiss Margaret's mouth and caress her breasts, his crotch in reach of Trapper's hand. He looked into Margaret's big blue eyes and could tell the exact moment when Trapper penetrated her. Her eyes widened and then Trapper must've started thrusting because her eyes squeezed shut and she muttered, "Goddammit, Trapper John, you really like humping, don't you?"

It was obviously a rhetorical question, so both men just chuckled. Then Hawkeye kissed along her heart-shaped face, from pointed chin to her flushed cheeks then the hairline and down the other side.

***

Margaret was licking up the results of the last handjob when Trapper lay next to her and whispered, "My hand isn't tired if you want some more. And I'd love to do doggy style with you and we can bring Hawkeye into it somehow. Would you like that? "

"Yes!" she cried. He'd been direct without being crude. And she would like that, all of it, including including Ben.

She moved into position, letting her legs dangle off the bed. She had the feeling that when he swapped out his hand for his penis, it would be quick.

His hand teased inside her folds while the thumb played with her clitoris. She could feel herself teetering on the edge of orgasm again, but it didn't happen until Hawkeye's blue eyes looked into hers with mischief and wonder and love. She tilted herself back and met the tip of Trapper's penis. He thrust forward easily but she was of course very wet and open.

She was startled for a moment, but she wanted this, God, how she wanted this! And he obviously did, too, the way he was thrusting in and out of her so greedily. Her vagina was hungry for him, even more than it'd been before she rode him. He was thicker than Ben but her vagina was ready to accommodate him. She thought of how it'd reshaped to fit various men over the years, how she'd reshaped her whole self to fit different men. She wouldn't change for Trapper. She didn't love him and this was only one crazy weekend.

She muttered, "Goddammit, Trapper John, you really like humping, don't you?" She was more impressed than annoyed though, and she didn't mind that her comment made both men laugh.

It wasn't just that he was vigorous, although he was that. He also was stroking her clitoris with as much care as if nothing else claimed his attention.

Ben, sweet Ben, kissed the outline of her face. She wanted to French kiss him and she wanted to play with his flaccid penis. But when she reached for Ben's crotch, Trapper's arm was in the way. She was glad the men weren't neglecting each other.

She started necking with Ben instead. It was a bit sloppy, all things considered, but it added to the fun.

And Trapper kept filling her again and again, his athlete's body strong and graceful, warm as it covered her in the cool of a San Francisco summer evening.

When she came, she cried both their names, but not like before.

***

Trapper tried not to take it personally when Margaret stopped fucking him. He gave Hawkeye some attention and not just because Hawk was being such a good sport about all this.

But he knew what he wanted from Margaret and he thought he knew how to ask her this time.

And she said yes and before he knew it he was fucking her doggy style. He stroked her clit, wanting her to come again, all around his cock.

When she said he really liked humping, he couldn't deny it, even if he'd wanted to. He really liked it, always had, always would. But he hadn't liked it this much in a long time.

She clenched him as she necked with Hawkeye. And when she came, she moaned, "Ben! John!"

That made him come, along with everything else.

It was an ending and a beginning. There would be more that weekend, for all three of them. More singing, more pot, more wine, more hugging, more kissing, more necking, more petting, more sex, different kinds of sex. Plus sleep, showers, and meals.

But he would never again come for the first time between Margaret's gorgeous legs.

***

"So how was your weekend with the Pierces?" B.J. asked, handing Trapper a can of beer.

They were sitting in the sunny yellow Hunnicutt kitchen. Mike and J.T. were out in the garage, working on a go-kart. Peg and Erin were at the grocery store.

If Trapper were capable of blushing, B.J. would've thought he'd blushed at the question. Trapper popped open the beer and took a sip before he said, "I thought you don't like people to kiss and tell."

"Who told you that?"

"Someone we've both kissed."

B.J. chuckled and then sighed. "It's not that I don't like it. It's just, well, what seemed to work best for us back then."

"Ah. Yeah, I kissed them."

B.J. wasn't sure whether to ask if they'd done more than kiss, or how to ask if he did. So he said, "I guess the wine helped."

"Yeah, thanks."

B.J. was going to drop it. He didn't need to know, unless Hawkeye wanted to tell him someday.

He popped open his beer, but before he could drink any, Trapper said, "Can you keep a secret? Even from Hawkeye?"

"Well, he still doesn't know what my initials stand for."

Trapper snorted and B.J. could guess what he was thinking. Aloud Trapper said, "It's nothing bad, but at the airport I gave Margaret a hug goodbye."

"I doubt Hawkeye would object to that."

Trapper shook his head. "Not that. While we were hugging, she whispered, 'Forty-eight.' "

"Like 1948?" B.J. thought of how in '48 he'd just started his courtship of Peg and his residency in Sausalito.

"I think she was telling me her age."

"Ah." B.J. did the math. She was three years older than Hawkeye, which wasn't much, but probably enough for Hawk to tease her if he found out.

"Why would she tell me that?"

B.J. took a sip of beer before answering. "Piercintyre."

"What?"

"That thing Henry Blake said once." He didn't explain how he knew, and Trapper didn't seem to expect him to. "And then they're married and have a son. But what do you two have?"

"Forty-eight. Except now I've told you."

"Then that's what we have."

Trapper smiled that crooked grin of his and clinked his beer can against B.J.'s. Then the two friends went to check on the go-kart.


End file.
